Ally's Song
by kcabfy
Summary: And you know what they say, when you see or spend time with a certain person regularly, either one would end up developing feelings for the other.
1. Chapter 1

**Yay! Another Auslly story! I was previously writing a Hunger Games fic, but I got really bored with it so I put it on-hold temporarily. Maybe if I find some inspiration, I might start working on that again. But I won't be giving up on that one, I'll finish it someday. ANYWAY, PUTTING THAT THOUGHT ASIDE, this is an AU Austin & Ally, in which Ally is really not a very musical person and Austin together with Dez, Elliot, and Dallas are in a band. Having said that, let's get on with the first chapter, shall we?**

**I hope you like it because I'm really excited for this story. I have everything planned out and it's gonna be EPIC!**

* * *

**Chapter 1**

Ally is losing her mind.

It's Thursday and it's the second to the last day of third term, obviously meaning that tomorrow is when the teachers are officially uninviting any homework and projects that may come through their doors. And her business plan project just may be one of those.

She isn't really a slacker. It's just that since she's going to be a senior next year, tons and tons of preparations had been cutting back some of the hours she allotted specifically for the said project.

"Ally, could you please slow down?" Ally's friend, Trish, calls out from behind her as she hurriedly runs up the stairs that lead to the school's main doors.

"No, I need to turn this in right now!" Ally replies over her shoulder. She adjusts the strap of her bag on her shoulders before rather violently pushing the doors open, almost hitting a guy square on the face.

"I don't get why you are in such a rush. You still have time after school, or during school to turn that project in." Trish says, finally reaching Ally and is now struggling to keep up with her friend's brisk pace.

"Lindquist doesn't accept projects after school, and I've got other things to do later." Ally simply states.

When she and Trish reach the stairs to the second floor, she grips the handles firmly as she runs up the stairs, dodging everyone she may come in contact with. Unfortunately, she fails to take notice of the three boys sprinting down the stairs as though they are in a hurry to be somewhere else.

Trish has seen them, luckily, but it's already too late to warn Ally about the oncoming boys. The lack of forewarning results into an unpleasant clash between Ally and Austin Moon, that one boy in her group of friends who barely communicates with her.

"What the f—"

Ally is suddenly cut off by the sound of a guitar dropping. She looks down and her mouth and eyes open wide as she watches it go on a heartbreaking trip down the stairs, the guitar shattering into pieces with each step. After having to stand there and watch the horrifying occurrence in front of her, the guitar finally reaches the end of the stairs; and all Ally can do at the moment is to gawk at the horrifying sight of the broken instrument. More importantly, she's now terrified to face the owner himself.

And when one familiar voice speaks out, Ally immediately knows it's a bad day to be running up that flight of stairs.

"Because I love you, Ally, I insist you run." Dez advises from behind her.

But she doesn't; instead, she remains in her spot, mouth agape, and overall preparing for what is about to come regarding Austin's rage. Elliot has told her once that he's got the worst temper out of the four. He described him basically as a beast.

Since it's Elliot's most favorite guitar out of his wide collection, he simply goes ballistic. His fingers curl wickedly and his jaw tightens. He raises his hands up and exasperatingly rubs his face up and down before reaching for his hair and irritatingly pulls at it. He's very much aware that he's on campus and that the person he wants to murder on the spot is a girl, so he reluctantly keeps his fiendish chain of cusses to himself.

As though to save Ally from Austin, the bell rings, signaling the students to start heading to their classes. Dez pats Austin on his shoulder and had to forcefully drag him away from Ally. She looks back to see Elliot, Dez, and Austin picking up the shattered guitar off of the floor, Austin muttering something along the lines of wanting to erase Ally's face permanently.

"Let's go, Ally, we don't want to be late." Trish whispers, grabbing Ally by her arm and guiding her further up the stairs.

"I didn't even have the chance to apologize." Ally mumbles, still a bit shaken after witnessing how angry Austin was about his guitar.

"We'll see him at lunch. You can apologize to him then."

Suddenly, Ally feels a calloused hand wrap around her own, gently pulling her to the side and away from Trish. She looks back at her friend, but Trish's looking behind Ally and nodding at whoever the person who pulled her away before completely walking out of sight.

Ally turns her head around and sees Dallas, his expression a bit tense.

"Dallas." Ally whispers in slight surprise.

"Ally, I saw what happened between you and Austin in the stairs," Dallas seethes, his one hand dropping Ally's before balling both his hands into fists. "I'm going to make sure Austin's gonna get a proper lesson from me later on."

Ally immediately shakes her head. "No, no. Please, don't do whatever you are planning to do, Dallas. It will only make the tension between Austin and I worse. And I don't want that."

There's barely two minutes left before the tardy bell rings when Dallas finally simmers down and asks Ally if she's all right. She replies that she's fine, and that he doesn't have to worry much about her.

"Look, I just want to let you know that even though our relationship ended, I'm still going to look out for you. And I don't plan on stopping anytime." Dallas softly says, taking a step closer to Ally to reach for her hand.

She pulls away just in time, her eyes leaving Dallas's. She looks down at the floor, suddenly finding it interesting. Her relationship with Dallas ended just barely a month ago, and she couldn't deny the fact that she still has some feelings left for him. She was the one who decided to call it off without stating her reason, and since then, Dallas had been hot on her tail, asking what her reason is. It's very complicated, her reason for their breakup.

"It's nice to hear that you still care for me, Dallas, but…"

"I still love you, Ally, all right? And I know that you still feel the same—"

"I have to get to class. My teacher isn't really a fan of tardy students…but then again, who is?" Ally chuckles lightly as an effort to lift up the rather awkward mood happening between her and Dallas.

Ally continues up the next set of stairs, leaving Dallas at the bottom, watching her with longing eyes.

* * *

It's exactly five minutes after the last period's bell, and Ally is once again seen running down the same flight of stairs. The morning encounter with Austin Moon didn't serve much as a lesson for her. But this time, Trish is not the only one running after her, Ally's other friend, Carrie, has joined the almost impossible chase as well.

"Seriously, Ally!" Trish raises her voice, her hand tightly grasping the handlebars as she once almost missed a step on her way down. "How much sugar have you had today? You've been running all day, you should at least be exhausted by now."

"He usually leaves right after the last bell rings, and I _need_ to talk to him!" Ally raggedly responds.

"Whom are you talking about?" Trish questions.

But Ally only continues to run.

As soon as she gets to the lobby overlooking the school's parking lot, Ally sees Austin standing by his car with a massive grin on his face, while her cousin, Brooke, loads his car excitingly. Ally's smile drops, disappointed by the fact that she's not able to catch Austin on time.

Trish and Carrie finally reach Ally, both are out of breath. They watch her as she keeps her eyes focused on that certain spot in the parking lot, and when they turn to see who she's looking at, they immediately know what Ally is—or _was_—attempting to do.

"He's not going to listen to you, Ally," Carrie ventures, still panting. "I thought he's made it clear earlier during lunch?"

"I know, but…it wouldn't hurt to try, right?" Ally replies, finally detaching her eyes away from Austin and Brooke, who are now driving off to who knows where. "Besides, I don't want to be at war with someone from our group of friends. That's the last thing I ever want to happen."

"If you're really that determined to get his forgiveness, Trish and I are more than willing to help you. We'll talk to Austin for you tomorrow, and we promise that both of you would be back in good terms in no time." Says Carrie.

Abruptly, Ally has an idea.

"Come with me." She states, turning to her friends with the widest smile plastered on her face.

"Where are we going?" Carrie asks.

"To the mall,"

"The mall? Ally, it's Thursday. I would much rather go there tomorrow." Trish says, staying on her spot in the lobby in an attempt to hold Ally back and maybe change her mind.

Ally, who just barely started walking, stops in her tracks to face her friends again. "So what if it's Thursday? It's not like we're going to take up a lot of time there, anyway. I just need to stop by a store and buy something."

"Fine, we'll go with you." Sighing, Trish finally caves in.

"One question, though." Carrie adds.

"What?"

"How are we going to get there?"

Since Ally's car is currently in the repair shop, and won't be able to redeem for another four days, they have no source of transportation. Both Trish and Carrie don't have their cars with them as well as they usually carpool on Thursdays and Fridays with their other friends.

"Oh, shoot." Ally mumbles to herself before looking at her friends hopefully. "We can call a cab, perhaps?"

And as if someone had secretly dialed his number and asked him to save these three car-less girls, Dallas Erwin suddenly steps in, a huge grin on his face.

"Perhaps not." He states, grabbing the attention of all three girls.

"Dallas?" Ally asks in confusion, having remembered that often times the boy would stay at school for a little while to chat with his senior friends before actually going home. He never leaves the school this early. "What did you say again?"

"I can take you there," Dallas replies coolly. "To the mall, I mean."

Ally shakes her head, declining the boy's generous offer. "No, you're just going to waste your gas on us." She reasons.

"You're not going to be a waste of gas. I need to stop by the mall anyway to pick up some stuff I need on Monday." Dallas informs, hoping that Ally will somehow fall for it.

She really wants to decline his offer, but him wasting his gas on her and her friends is really not her main reason. She doesn't like the idea, thinking that it's one of Dallas's ways of lighting back their old flame. He's been giving that signal since the first week of their breakup. Ally eyes Trish and Carrie, the same time Dallas does, and she notices that both of them are nodding their head as if urging her to agree to Dallas's offer.

"Trish and Carrie already agreed…it's all up to you now." Dalla says.

Ally sighs in defeat. There's no point in declining it now because she knows Dallas's going to drive her and her friends to the mall one way or another. It's one thing she doesn't like about him: how he always finds a way through everything. And dismayingly, she shares that trait with him.

Turning around, she starts to walk towards Dallas's car. It surprises her that she still remembers every little detail about him, like which parking space Dallas prefers. He probably already has his initials painted on the ground so that no one could take it away from him.

"What are you three waiting for? Christmas?" Ally questions when she notices that neither Trish, nor Carrie, nor Dallas are following her.

"Yeah, which is happening in like eight months!" Carrie chirps excitedly.

"Come on, we don't want to be out late on a school night!" Ally signals all three of them to hurry before turning away and resumes walking.

They get to Dallas's car and completely out of an old habit, Ally reaches for the passenger's seat door handle, but Dallas's hand stops her from opening it.

"I don't recall you claiming shotgun." He says, earning a snicker from Trish and Carrie.

"Oh—okay then, sorry." Ally looks away, her cheeks heating up in embarrassment. Apparently, she thinks she missed the memo about not being allowed in the passenger seat any longer if she's not Dallas Erwin's girlfriend.

Dallas suddenly bursts out laughing as he opens the car door. "Ally, I was just joking. I never thought you'd take it so seriously."

"Well, you looked all serious, so could you really blame me?" She retorts back, her voice having a tinge of annoyance in it.

"I was just messing with you, okay? Hop in, now." Dallas giggles, waiting for Ally to load his car.

"Dallas Chase Erwin—"

"Do you want me to start calling you by your real name now, _Allison_?" Dallas cuts her off, knowing for a fact that by the time Ally starts calling him by his full name, something's about to go down.

"I'm getting this tingly feeling inside, and chills are running down my spine. My cheeks are heating up as well. And, oh! So much love in the air!" Carrie suddenly teases from behind Ally and Dallas.

Carrie feels Trish gently elbowing her, and that's only when she notices the sudden awkwardness hanging around Ally and Dallas. Realizing what she's done, she clears her throat before asking, "So, are we going or are we not?"

Ally breaks eye contact with Dallas as she finally loads his car. Dallas closes the door, and nods at both Trish and Carrie, gesturing them to start getting in as well. Soon enough, everyone is officially settled in and ready to go.

* * *

"I'll just drop you guys off here, I still have to find a parking spot." Dallas announces, stopping the car once it's outside the front doors of the mall.

The three girls agree, unloading Dallas's car and thanking him before he drives away. Ally doesn't waste any time and immediately heads inside the mall, leaving both Trish and Carrie wondering what their friend is currently up to now.

Once inside the mall, Trish and Carrie walk alongside Ally, trying to find any clue that would give away their friend's real intention of going to the mall. Their confusion is suddenly answered as soon as Ally starts to make her way to a music store.

"Last time I checked, Ally, you're not really the most musical person I know." Carrie ventures. She doesn't even wait for Ally to retort back as the CD aisle abruptly catches her attention.

Ally, on the other hand, is currently deep in thought, trying to remember how Austin's guitar looked like exactly. She's not even sure if she can find the same one in this music store. Austin probably had the guitar shipped from a different country, like from Australia or England—the guitar even might have come from Portugal for all she knows! Also, she's not real sure if Austin is that type of guitar guy who prefers buying from one brand only.

"This is hopeless. Why did I even think about doing this?" Ally mutters to herself, reaching up to grab her brown hair and messing it up like the way she always does when she's frustrated.

"Can I help you with something?" A voice that sounds so very familiar to Ally speaks from behind her.

She swivels around quickly, eager to know the owner of the voice.

"Dez? What are you doing here?" Ally questions.

Dez smiles before he gestures at the entire store. "I work here."

"Oh—perfect!"

Dez's eyebrows furrow in confusion. "Do you need some help, Ally?" He asks, thinking that she's probably in desperate need of an employee that would be willing to help her with whatever she needs help with.

"Glad you asked because I am _desperate_." Ally sighs, allowing her shoulders to slug.

Dez laughs before showing off his uniform at Ally. He points at the logo and says, "Official employee, Dez Worthy, ready to serve you. Now, what do you need help with?" He formally asks, placing both of his hands behind his back.

"Okay, so this morning, I broke my friend's favorite guitar and I was wondering if you happen to be selling the exact same one?" Ally plays along, mocking Dez's tone of voice from when he asked her.

Dez shakes his head in disbelief. "You're buying Austin a guitar just to earn his apology? I witnessed your first attempt during lunch a while ago by the way, and it wasn't pretty."

"Exactly why I'm buying him the same guitar." Ally answers in a matter-of-fact. "So, are you selling it or what? Just let me know now so I can go hunt in a different store."

"Lucky for you, this is where Austin bought his guitar." Dez responds, relieving Ally.

"Great—now, where is it?"

"Ally, can I be honest with you?" Dez asks, his playful vibe suddenly gone.

The girl only raises an eyebrow, which hopefully gives Dez the answer he's looking for.

"Austin is a very hard guy to placate, I admit that, but that guitar is so expensive, are you really willing to give up a large amount of money just to earn his apology?" Dez asks almost in a whisper. "That's really sweet, in my opinion, if you're really going to spend thousands of dollars just for Austin, but if I were you, I wouldn't do it. It's not worth it, Ally."

"I like Austin, okay, but not in that kind of way. He's a really cool guy, and I don't want a stupid guitar to ruin our friendship." Ally answers, masking the fact that she's disappointed Dez won't even support her on this.

She knows that they're in a band, so Austin probably _needs _that guitar.

"Sucks for you, it already did."

"Say what now?"

"Austin apparently made it official that you're off his friends list." Dez confesses, keeping his gaze on Ally to see her reaction.

"Okay then, there's another reason for me to buy that stupid guitar—now, show me where it is." Ally voices out, although it's pretty easy to tell that she's hurt from what Dez had told her.

Dez's shoulders slug. "I guess I have no say in this anymore, right? You're still going to buy that guitar no matter what I say?" He asks while he leads Ally to the place where she can find the demanded instrument.

"Nope, not gonna change my mind."

"What if I say that you're going to end up broke after purchasing that guitar?"

"Give up now, Dez. Nothing's going to change my mind."

Dez scoffs, thinking how unbelievable Ally can be sometimes. "You are just like Dallas."

"So I've been told."

* * *

**So there's the first chapter for you, peeps! The second chapter might be shorter than this because that was supposedly chapter one as well, but then I was kinda noticing how this chapter is already long, so I broke it down into two chapters instead.**

**If you want to see what happens next, stay tuned because this is going to get better, trust me.**

**Let me know what you think about this! Thank you!**

**P.S. If you notice an out-of-place name, please don't be afraid to inform me. I write all my stories with original characters and I just basically replace them with A&A characters. So yeah, let me know...**


	2. Chapter 2

**First off, thank you for the lovely reviews from the last chapter! I also got tons of follows and favorites and they were all just lovely! Thank you! Second, I just want to clarify that Alison and Charlie lives in a small apartment. And their apartment is not like one of those where it's located in one building. I was thinking it's like a small house, but I really don't know how to call it or what they are called, so I just stuck to apartment. It's like a rented house, I guess. But, oh well. **

**Anyway, I hope you enjoy this one! Trust me, chapter 3 is where it all really begins. I'm so excited!**

* * *

**Chapter Two**

After waiting for Ally to finish paying for the guitar, Trish takes out her phone from her jeans pocket to check the time. It's barely six in the evening, so once Ally steps out of the store, she asks her and Carrie if they want to grab dinner at the mall.

Ally fidgets with her fingers, shifting her weight from foot to foot. "Uh, can we just call up Dallas and ask him to drive us back to my apartment? It's still early, so I was thinking that maybe we can stay there for a little while and catch up on our favorite TV shows." She suggests, giggling nervously.

Carrie tilts her head to the side, confused with how her friend is suddenly acting. "Ally, why did you buy that guitar?" She questions, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I want to learn how to play it?" Ally's answer comes out more as a question.

"Ally," This time, it's Trish who's asking. She has this voice of authority that she uses as her way of intimidating someone into confessing, or for educational purposes, to convince a person that her idea is worth investing anyone's money for. "How much is that guitar? Be honest with us."

"It's only half a thousand dollars." Ally lies, not really feeling like revealing the true amount of the instrument.

"No, it's not." Trish answers solidly.

Sighing, Ally looks down at the guitar before meeting Trish's stern eyes. "It's almost two-thousand dollars." She admits in a low voice.

"Two-thousand dollars!" Trish exclaims. "And how much money have you got?"

"About a thousand maximum," Ally admits, but then quickly adds, "but I convinced Dez to just let me pay for the guitar for a thousand dollars. He said he'd take care of the rest."

Trish looks at Ally unconvinced. She's not entirely sure why Dez agreed to her, but Ally must have used up all of her charm to get him to pay for the remaining half of the price. Still suspicious about how Ally worked her way through Dez, Trish reaches for the unwrapped guitar and inspects it. She does a once-over and immediately recognizes the instrument.

Trish huffs. "This is for Austin, am I right?"

Ally nods, retrieving the guitar from Trish. She slings the guitar strap over her shoulder and holds onto it, as though she doesn't want Trish or Carrie to take it away from her.

"I don't get why you have to spend all of your money on him. Ally, in case you didn't know, Austin is in a band. I'm pretty sure he's got plenty of other guitars in his house."

"I know, but—can we just drop this? Dez's already given me a lecture and I'm pretty sure I've had enough for this day. Also, I'm really hungry now."

"Okay, but just make sure Dez wouldn't lose his job because of what you did." Trish says.

"Why do you suddenly care so much about Dez?"

"Uh, hello? He's my friend, so I'm pretty sure it's legal for me to care for him." Trish reasons, but deep down, she knows there's another reason behind. It's a very personal matter for her at the moment, and she's not sure if she's ready to tell Ally and Carrie all about it yet.

"Okay, fine; I'll make sure Dez gets to keep his job." Ally promises followed by an eye roll.

"I'm starving," Carrie suddenly announces. "Can we go eat now?"

"Because I'm broke, you guys are paying. I generously offered all the food I have at my apartment, but both of you turned it down." Ally says, trailing behind Trish and Carrie as they head to their chosen restaurant.

* * *

"Austin, you do know we could have just went to one of the street restaurants we passed by, right? You could've used that two dollars for something else rather than for the parking fee." Brooke states as she and Austin enter a restaurant.

Austin shrugs while he holds the door open for Brooke. "I just thought that this would be convenient. Besides, those street restaurants you mentioned sounds too fancy for me." He replies, entering the restaurant himself after Brooke.

"You're right; they do kind of look too fancy. Too fancy for our age, at least."

They are soon being led by a waitress to a table for three in the corner, and once they are both settled down, the waitress hands them their menus. She leaves to give Brooke and Austin the time to decide which dish they may want to order.

Even though Austin is sitting on the chair facing the entrance of the restaurant, he fails to notice the three girls entering as he is so concentrated trying to decide which of the two dishes he wants to try. After a minute or so, Austin places his menu down on the table mentally finalizing his selected meal just as Ally and her friends pass by his table.

"Are you ready to order?" Austin asks Brooke.

Brooke smiles and shakes her head. "Give me two minutes." She scans the first two pages again, and nods when Austin excuses himself to go to the bathroom.

Just as Austin enters the men's bathroom, Ally exits the ladies', once again completely missing each other.

* * *

Ally is dusting off nonexistent dirt on her jeans after coming out of the bathroom, when she raises her eyes and sees her cousin sitting alone in the corner booth. She stalks towards her table before putting on her biggest smile.

"Hey, cousin; what are you doing here?" Ally asks, situating herself on the chair facing the window that overlooks the busyness of the mall.

"Ally?" Brooke questions in surprise, her eyes dilating and her hand making its way immediately up to her chest. After she's somehow calmed down, she adds, "I could ask you the same thing."

Ally takes a quick glance towards her table before hooking her thumb to the same direction. "I kind of dragged Trish and Carrie with me here because I had to stop by the music store to get the album of that band I'm obsessing over recently. And then we got hungry." She explains. Part of her wishes that Brooke would believe her lie about her music store escapade.

Brooke presses her lips together, nodding.

"How about you? You haven't answered my question yet." Ally presses, sensing that Brooke won't be stating any comments about what she just said.

"The same as you: just grabbing dinner." Brooke replies.

"Alone?"

Brooke opens her mouth to respond, but she gets distracted after seeing Austin making his way back to their table. She's quite aware of the relationship between Ally and Austin, and she doesn't really want the both of them to ruin a night that's been going perfectly for her…at least that's how it is currently.

"So, are you ready to order?" Austin asks just as he's standing behind Ally. He's looking down at his phone (probably texting Dallas, Elliot, or Dez) so he doesn't notice the girl sitting in front of him.

Ally shuts her eyes tightly, having recognized the person attached to that voice. Although it's highly impossible, she slowly swivels around in her chair in hopes that he could possibly be a different guy. But unfortunately for her, he's none other than Austin Moon, the last boy she ever wants to encounter at the moment.

Austin looks down at the girl in front of him and his expression clearly resembles his obvious surprise.

"Ally?"

"Austin?"

Both question in unison.

"What are you doing here?"

Still in sync, Austin and Ally ask each other.

"Uh, I'm grabbing dinner with my friends." Ally responds, glancing at Trish and Carrie who are now watching their interaction with interested eyes. "How about you? What kind of natural disaster had sucked you in and dropped you off here?"

"Isn't it obvious? I'm having dinner with Brooke." Austin answers, gesturing at Brooke and ignoring Ally's bitter remark.

Ally looks back and forth from Brooke to Austin, and then looks at Brooke again. Her eyes soon have that twinkle when everything in her brain suddenly clicks in place.

"Are you two dating now? Brooke! How come you never told me about this?" Ally says, playfully hitting her cousin on her shoulder.

"There was nothing to tell you about! Austin just recently had the balls to ask me out a while ago during lunch after you disappeared from our table." Brooke replies, her smile slowly turning into one of a teasing smirk. "I wish you would've stayed though; you should have seen how Austin struggled with his words."

"She didn't have to know that." Austin, all of a sudden, pipes in. The conversation is getting out of hand; soon he's going to be losing a large amount of dignity. "Ally, get out of here." He orders harshly.

"And why should I?" Ally hits back, deciding she's in the mood to mess with Austin. She misses their constant bickering; she almost couldn't even remember the last time she pokes fun at him. She's always the nice one between the two when fighting.

"Please, I'm actually being polite here." Austin replies with a hint of sarcasm in his tone of voice.

"Define polite, Austin."

"Ally—_ugh!_ Just go back to your table!"

Ally rolls her eyes before turning to face Brooke. "I'll catch up with you later, okay?" She informs, and with Brooke's nod, she stands up and heads back to her table.

* * *

"Okay, what is that all about?" Carrie asks as soon as Ally slumps down with a sigh on her seat.

"What is what all about?" Ally questions back innocently.

"Austin glaring at you? If I know, he's probably murdering you right now in his head." Carrie answers with an eye roll.

"No, he isn't glaring."

"Yes, he is. In fact, he's doing it right now. Just look at him."

Ally swiftly turns around in her chair, just in time to catch Austin glaring in her direction, it's almost as though he's trying to burn a hole in her back. She furrows her eyebrows at him causing for Austin to roll his eyes and turn his attention back to Brooke as if his previous actions has been nothing.

"He still thinks I'm fully responsible for breaking his guitar when in the first place, he's the one who wasn't looking at where he's going! Trish, you saw me dodging everyone right?" Ally fumes controllably. She tries to keep in mind she's in a public place, so bursting out right in the middle of a restaurant is totally out of the question.

"Well…you were kind of not looking as well…" Trish slowly states, partly guilty because of her not warning Ally about Austin and his band mates that were hurriedly sprinting down the stairs that morning.

"It doesn't matter! He was still the one not looking at where he's going for the most part!" Ally, hardheaded as ever, protests.

She glances at the guitar resting next to her and glares at it as though it's Austin. She suddenly feels so enraged about the unpleasant incident that morning that she's actually starting to consider taking the guitar back to the store and demand for a rightful refund. Dez will be happy about that, Ally thinks, since he doesn't have to worry about paying for the other half of the price of the guitar.

Fortunately, Ally recollects herself and decides to keep the guitar.

* * *

After dinner, Trish and Carrie successfully hide the guitar away from Austin while Ally distracts him and Brooke by going to their table and chatting them up. Once Ally secretly makes sure the guitar is already nowhere in sight, she says goodbye to her cousin.

As Ally is standing up from the chair, Brooke takes her wrist and sits her back down.

"Does Trish or Carrie have a car with them?" Brooke asks having remembered that Ally doesn't have her car back yet.

"No."

"How are you gonna get home?"

"We'll probably just call a cab." Ally answers frankly.

Brooke shakes her head, her protectiveness rapidly becoming evident. "Ally, you do know how I feel about taking cabs at this time of the night, right?" She reminds.

"Brooke, it's only seven. I'm pretty sure no psychopaths are out of their caves yet."

"You don't know what you're saying." Brooke solidly comments. "Austin and I are almost done anyway; we're just waiting for the bill. You should just ride with us. It's much safer than taking a cab."

"No!" Austin and Ally scream simultaneously, causing for the other people in the restaurant to turn their heads toward their direction.

Brooke presses her lips together, already done with Austin and her cousin's child-like catfight. "Well then, how are you gonna get home? I still don't want you taking a cab." She says.

"Oh, you don't have to worry about me taking a cab. I just barely remembered Dallas is here as well. In fact, he was the one who drove me, Trish, and Carrie here in the first place. I'll just call him up; hopefully he's still here." Ally notifies, reaching behind her to take out her phone from her jeans' back pocket.

"Dallas?" Brooke abruptly perks up upon hearing the boy's name. "He's here?"

Ally nods with her phone placed by her ear, waiting for Dallas to pick up his phone.

"If he answers, can you please ask him to meet you here?" Brooke requests.

Ally doesn't really see the point of doing that, but she does tell Dallas to meet her at the restaurant anyway as soon as he picks up the call.

* * *

Dallas arrives eight minutes after the call was dropped. He enters the restaurant sporting his usual wide grin and tousled hair. He easily spots Ally as she's the only person standing in the entire restaurant (not counting the waiters), and happily makes his way to her.

Ally smiles when she feels Dallas wrapping an arm around her shoulder automatically. She likes it when he does that because it kind of became his way of greeting her. In school, he never lets her pass by him unless she gives him a high-five.

"Hey, Brooke," Dallas greets before turning to Austin and acknowledges him as well. "So, why do you want me to come meet you here? And where are Carrie and Trish? Did they ditch you?" Dallas bombards Ally with queries.

"No, they didn't. Trish and Carrie went to check out something in a store that I'm not completely interested in, so they decided that I would just meet them by the bookstore on the second floor." Ally excuses, and just as she's about to add something, Austin interrupts.

"It wasn't Ally's idea, asking you to meet her here. It was Brooke's."

"Oh," Slightly disappointed, Dallas replies as he looks at Austin and then at Brooke.

"Dallas, where were you when Ally called anyway?" Brooke perkily inquires.

"I was in the parking lot just about to get in my car," Dallas answers coolly. "I was in a rush actually."

"Well, Dallas, I want to thank you for always being there for my cousin." Brooke says, her eyes not leaving Dallas's. "I mean, you were in a rush and I'm pretty sure it's because of something important, and you didn't even hesitate to walk back in and get Ally."

Ally furrows her eyebrows, not really understanding what Brooke is trying to get at. She's almost starting to think that perhaps her cousin has a thing for Dallas, but then again, there's Austin. He kind of stands as living evidence that Ally's assumption may be false. Besides, why would Brooke go on a date with Austin if there were a possibility that she likes someone else? Or maybe she's just trying to be nice?

Ally shakes her head lightly to shake off her thoughts.

"Nah, it's not a big deal," Ally hears Dallas responding, "I'm willing to do anything for Ally. I mean, come on! Who can't resist this girl?" He teases, leaning away from Ally for a second to look at her face before tousling her hair.

"Dallas!" Ally complains, stepping away from him to painfully pinch his side.

"Ow! What did you do that for?" Dallas asks as he rubs his right core.

Ally widens her eyes at Dallas as though she's trying to hint at something. She didn't just pinch him for messing up her hair, but she's trying to tell him to stop talking too much. She and Dallas made an agreement to never drop hints about their ended romantic relationship to anyone because _no one, _not even Brooke knows about it. Even her parents know nothing about it.

The arrival of Brooke and Austin's bill signifies Dallas and Ally's cue to leave. They say their goodbyes—of course Ally insisting to Brooke that she should tell her about how her day ended up in a restaurant with Austin—before Dallas and Ally exit the restaurant.

Soon, Trish and Carrie emerge from out of nowhere, Austin's guitar in hand. Dallas asking about the guitar is really inevitable so Ally tells him the same exact lie that she told Trish and Carrie a while ago: that she wants to learn how to play the guitar.

Much to Ally's relief, Dallas does not ask any further questions.

* * *

After dropping Carrie off at her house, Dallas and Ally are the only ones left in the car. Ally's apartment is barely a five-minute drive from Carrie's, and they arrived at her apartment sooner than expected.

"So…goodnight?" Dallas states after turning his car's engine off.

Ally presses her lips together, nodding. "Goodnight." She mumbles.

For some reason, she can't find the urge to open the car door and step out because of the way Dallas is looking at her longingly. It's as if he wants to say or _do _something, but he's hesitating. Finally, Dallas lets out a quick breath before quickly leaning in.

Ally knows what is about to happen. She knows in any moment, Dallas's lips will meet hers; but since she has this thing going on where she doesn't want to give Dallas false hope that they could get back together, Ally quickly turns her head away the same time she feels Dallas's upper lip barely brushing hers.

"Goodnight, Dallas." Ally mutters, avoiding Dallas's gaze. She opens the passenger door and hurriedly steps out.

Dallas nods disappointingly. "Yeah, goodnight, Ally." He mumbles lowly, too soft in a way that he's pretty sure she didn't even hear him.

Ally runs up to her front door, and at the sound of Dallas's car driving away, she turns around and watches him as his car becomes smaller and smaller until it's completely out of her sight. She lets out a heavy sigh before fumbling with her apartment keys, trying to find the right one that would open the front door.

Just as she barely twists the lock open, she hears a car coming and then completely stops in front of her apartment. Much to her surprise, Dallas steps out with a small smile on his face.

"I have an extra guitar case in my trunk. If you want it, you can have it." Dallas informs.

Ally briskly walks up to his trunk and opens it. She gladly takes the case out and silently thanks Dallas. The boy, in return, flashes her a sad smile, still disappointed about how their night turned out. And it's all because he wanted a simple kiss.

Standing by her front door, Ally watches Dallas drive away for the second time that night.

* * *

**I know there's not much A&A interaction yet, but I just want to give you guys an insight on Dallas and Ally's relationship, and how Austin has a thing for Brooke at first and has zero interest in Ally at all.**

**Anyway, let me know what you think! And I'll be back next Saturday! :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**Okay, I said that I would be back on Saturday, but since I had tons of free time today, I decided to write the third chapter. I enjoyed it too much, and now I have this up and ready to go. I apologize for any grammatical mistakes, I haven't edited this one yet because I was just in a hurry to post this chapter because I'm pretty thrilled with it! But don't fret though, I will be editing all of my chapters soon-possibly once the weekend rolls around.**

**But anyway, I'm here to respond to some of the reviews I got the last time. Sucks that ff . net doesn't really give us the access or capability to respond to our readers' reviews. We have to wait for the next update in order to reply back to our readers. (I put the responses on the bottom, so make sure you better read that because you might be missing on something!)**

* * *

**Chapter Three**

"Just five minutes, clock; give me just five minutes." Ally mumbles, her pillow muffling her voice. She stretches an arm to reach for her phone to switch off her alarm that has rang four times already.

Not long after ten seconds, Brooke comes banging on Ally's bedroom door, earning a groan from the girl still in bed.

"Ally, get up now! You're going to be late!" Brooke yells from the other side of the door as she continues banging.

"I just said five more minutes!"

"What do you want? Five more minutes or a ride to school?" Brooke threatens knowing that Ally still doesn't have her car, and mostly anyone that Ally can get a ride with are already in school.

"Five minutes." Ally answers.

"Fine, I'm leaving. But just so you know, it's already 7:15! You've got 15 minutes to get ready and to get to school." Brooke reminds teasingly. She jiggles her car keys one more time for Ally to hear before she runs down the stairs and out to her car.

Ally's body abruptly jolts up. Her hands quickly matting her disheveled hair down to its normal state as she hurries to the bathroom attached to her bedroom. She brushes her teeth and hair with a speed she never knew she's capable of. After, she literally sprints to her closet to take out her school's uniform. She puts it on (not even caring if her buttons are aligned improperly) as well as her shoes before running down the stairs.

If there is one thing Ally hates about being late, it would be not being able to eat her favorite cereal for breakfast. To her, she's just not Ally Dawson without it. But that morning, she pays little attention to that fact. She slings her backpack over one shoulder quickly as she notices Brooke backing out of the driveway. She tries to yell at her telling her to come back, but it's no use. Brooke just keeps on driving.

She warned Ally, and Ally didn't listen.

She lets out a heavy sigh while she remains standing in the middle of the road. Her eyes suddenly grow wide when she remembers something. Dropping her backpack, Ally runs back inside her apartment and up to her bedroom. She redeems Austin's new guitar, which she hid in her closet for some reason, before returning outside of her apartment.

"I guess I have to take the smelly bus then." Ally mutters to herself while picking up her backpack from the ground. She lazily makes her way to the bus stop, remembering all the funny and creepy experiences she's had of riding the same exact bus for almost three years.

* * *

"Hey, Austin, isn't that—"

"Pull over for a second." Austin instructs Dez.

"Why? We're gonna be late."

"Dez, just do it."

* * *

As Ally waits for the bus to arrive, which was supposed to be there five minutes ago, she sees a red car coming close and as it nears her, it's constantly slowing down. She furrows her eyebrows when the car completely stops right in front of her. Thinking that the person or the people inside the car are a bunch of psychopaths out to get her or something, she slowly inches away.

The darkly tinted window of the driver's side soon rolls down, revealing Dez, her closest friend amongst the guys of Austin's band (excluding Dallas, of course). She and Dez immediately clicked when her group of friends "merged" with his. The accidental merging was the main result of Dallas and Ally's secret relationship, as they both wanted to get to know each other's friends. Everyone got along right away…well, except for Ally and Austin.

"We have our reasons." The two always say every time they get asked why they don't get along.

Presently, Dez beams at Ally before hooking his thumb over his shoulder, gesturing at the backseat.

"Get in if you don't wanna be late." He says.

Ally adjusts the strap of the guitar case on her shoulder before opening the backseat door and climbing in, having no idea who's occupying the seat next to Dez. As soon as she closes the door, her eyes land on the boy who claimed shotgun, and her eyes widen in utter surprise.

Since Ally is sitting on the seat behind Dez, Austin can easily see her through the rearview mirror.

"I thought you always ride with Brooke ever since your car broke down?" Dez asks, stepping on the accelerator gently and turning his blinker on to take the right turn he was supposed to take before Austin requested for him to pull over.

"Well, it was between sleeping for five more minutes and her giving me a ride to school. Clearly, we all know which option I chose." Ally answers; looking at the windshield, but accidentally catches Austin watching her from the rearview mirror.

Dez laughs as he applies more force on the accelerator, going a tad above the speed limit.

"Actually, we just barely passed by her. Didn't we, Austin?" Dez sneaks a quick glance at Austin to see him nod.

Ally glances to her right and eyes the fast food restaurant as they pass by it. She would not have realized how hungry she really is had it not been for the delicious-looking purple and mustard colored building that is Panda Express. She licks her lip before rummaging through her bag in hopes that perhaps she's thrown a random granola bar somewhere in there.

She can still hear Dez talking, but all that she can ever think about is food.

Suddenly, Austin gently throws a McDonald's sack at her. Ally lets out a quiet squeal as the sack lands in her lap, the contents still heating up the bottom part of it.

"In case you didn't know, Austin Monica, I am not a garbage can. I'm kindly asking you to _please _stop throwing your trash at me." Ally states solidly, her eyes meeting Austin's through the rearview mirror.

"You're probably hungry." Austin replies, thinking that it's too early in the morning to be bickering with Ally.

Ally looks at the back of his head suspiciously before secretly peeking inside the sack of McDonald's Austin threw at her. She eyes a pouch of half-empty fries as well as a small box with six chicken nuggets left inside.

"I'm not hungry." Ally lies, thinking that Austin probably put a deadly chemical of some sort in it before he "generously" gave it to her.

And in that exact moment, Ally's stomach betrays her. Dez, who's been silent for a while, bursts out laughing while Austin only manages a small smile before taking a glance at Ally again through the rearview mirror.

The rest of the car ride goes somewhat quiet. Dez would sometimes burst out singing random songs that comes to his head or he would sing along to the radio, Austin would occasionally check on Ally through the mirror while she shamelessly munch on her scored McDonald's breakfast. She knows he's watching her, but she doesn't care. All that she can think about is how grateful she is at the moment to be having that delicious yet unhealthy breakfast courtesy of Austin Moon.

Once they get to school, the bell rings just in time. Ally hurries to get out of the car, thanking Dez for the ride along the way, as she purposely leave the guitar on the backseat. When she gets to the lobby, she hears Austin calling out to her.

"Ally, you left your—"

She smiles for she knows that Austin found the guitar.

* * *

Austin steps out of Dez's car before opening the backseat door to retrieve his backpack. He finds not only his bag, but a cased guitar as well. He takes it out, remembering that he saw Ally with it that morning. He's aware that she can't play—in fact; she's horrifically terrible at it. Austin heard her play one time and he wanted nothing but to snatch the guitar away from Ally and smash it into pieces right on the spot.

He attempts to call her to say that she left her guitar, and when he looks down, he sees a blue sticky note stuck on the case. He rips it off and reads it.

_I'm sorry about your guitar. Dez told me it was your favorite out of the bunch, and I felt guilty so I bought this one for you. I hope you'll like it—oh, whom am I kidding? It's the—wait, I'm not going to tell you. Duh, I'm not supposed to anyway. I'm running out of space to write on, but I'm still hoping you'll like it. – Ally xx_

Austin unzips the case and a huge smile spreads across his face when he sees the same exact guitar that was broken yesterday—same strap, same design, same everything. It's almost like his guitar was brought back to existence.

Dez, who already started walking towards the lobby, looks back and sees Austin smiling down. He knows he found the guitar, but in order to cover up his involvement (he contributed with designing the guitar the way Austin did on his old one), he asks him what's holding him up.

"Nothing." Austin simply answers, zipping the guitar case close. He slams the car door close before quickly jogging towards Dez who's now growing impatient.

* * *

Ally eyes the single shortest line as she struggles to make her way through the sea of students flooding the lunchroom. She sighs, suddenly remembering why she never really liked eating and/or buying school lunches. But since she gladly begged for those extra five minutes that morning, this is the consequence she's so unwilling to face.

"Note to self," she mumbles after a massive footballer bumped into her, "never ask for five more minutes. _Ever._"

"Ally!"

A familiar voice calls her name causing for her to stop in the middle of the lunchroom and that one genius dude in her Physics class to bump into her. He almost spilled his juice on her shirt, but Ally is quick to step away just in time.

"You're fast; I like it." The guy says winking at Ally before completely walking away.

Ally scrunches her nose at the guy before her eyes catches Dallas and his band mates standing by the entrance, gesturing for her to come to them. She quickly works her way towards them, and once she successfully does so, Dallas's arms automatically find its way across her shoulders.

"Come sit with us today." Dallas offers.

"But I promised Trish and Carrie that—"

"They're not even here." Elliot interrupts, holding onto the straps of his backpack playing with it.

"And how come you know this and I don't?"

Elliot reaches across to pat Ally's shoulder sympathetically. "I'm regretful to tell you that you've been replaced, Ally. I'm terribly sorry. I mean, I can't help that I'm just naturally more charming and fun than you are." He says in a soothing voice.

"Wow, someone's ego is through the roof!" Ally retorts back, seeing that that is how Elliot wants to play their little game.

"Come on now," Dallas suddenly speaks interrupting Elliot from what is supposed to be his most witty, apply-cold-water-to-burned-area come back yet…or at least that's what he thinks. "Let's just go get lunch and eat happily, okay?"

"Aw, aren't you just a little ball of sunshine?" Ally coos, pinching Dallas's cheek gently.

And that is mainly the reason why Austin spent his entire lunchtime constantly rolling his eyes at everything Dallas and Ally do.

* * *

"I would be glad to walk you to your next class if only mine isn't a gazillion miles away from yours." Dallas informs Ally as the first warning bell rings, signaling the students to start heading to their classes.

"Dallas, I think I can manage walking myself to my classes. I'm a pro now actually. Trust me, I've had a lot of practice for the past few years." Ally sarcastically replies.

It's this old boyfriend habit of Dallas's that she dislikes the most, how he always wants to walk Ally almost everywhere. She's seventeen and she's pretty sure she doesn't need a chaperone.

"Hey," Dez chirps in out of the blue, tapping Austin on his shoulder, "don't you have English next as well?"

"Yeah, I do. I have it with Ally actually."

Dez raises his arms up. "There you go, Dallas. Problem solved. Austin can walk Ally to her class." He says as he picks up his backpack and puts it on. He says his goodbye before heading off to his next class with Elliot trailing behind him.

"Like I said, I can manage—"

"Shut up and let's go." Austin slightly grips her arm firmly as he gently drags Ally away from Dallas.

* * *

The walk to their English class is pretty quiet and awkward. Austin and Ally keep a great distance between them as they walked. Occasionally, Ally will attempt to walk closer to Austin, but the boy would only inch away farther than before.

"Believe me, I hate the idea as much as you do. If not, I hate it thrice as much." Austin promptly voices out.

Ally looks at him, surprised that he bothered to start up a conversation. She bites the inside of her cheek to refrain herself from smiling. Realizing that she hasn't provided Austin with a response yet, she says, "Blame it all on Dallas. I mean I'm not a three-year-old that needs to be chaperoned every single time I go somewhere."

Austin lets out a chuckle. He shoves his hands in his jeans' pockets; all the while Ally keeps her eyes on him.

As they reach the stairs that would lead them to their classes, Ally finally puts on a full-on smile and says, "Austin? Are we…you know…friends? I mean I know we have the same circle of friends so I just thought that maybe—"

"Look, _Ally_, just because you apologized for breaking my guitar yesterday, and just because I asked Dez to pull over and give you a ride, and totally gave you the rest of my breakfast doesn't mean that we're cool; do you understand?" Austin raises his voice, careful not to full-on yell at the girl in front of him.

After hearing Ally's question, Austin concludes that she only asked that because he's been nice to her since that morning. It's very unlike him, so he scrambles to think of something rude to say to put the tension back between them.

Without waiting for her to answer, Austin continues up the stairs, and Ally follows behind him.

"Stop being so goddamn rude, Austin!"

Austin only acknowledges her statement by sarcastically laughing. He continues walking up, not even caring if he's leaving behind Ally.

Annoyed by Austin's rather bipolar attitude, Ally runs up the stairs in an attempt to catch up with Austin. She makes sure she's ahead of him by a few steps before she stops in front of Austin and raises her first as if she's going to punch him.

"Ah, so you're so tough now, huh, Ally? Let me see how tough you actually are." Austin turns sideways, generously offering his arm for Ally to punch. "Come on, punch me. Show me just how strong you are."

So Ally does; and very embarrassingly, she gave him a really girly punch.

"Wow, Hulk should start watching his back now. Someone may be stronger than him." Austin comments sarcastically, not even feeling the punch Ally gave him. To him, it felt like someone hit him on the arm with a pillow.

They finally reach their respective floor, and they powerwalked through the long hallway. Once outside their classroom door, Austin looks at Ally and strictly instructs her to knock, but she disobeys. And when one of them disobeys the other, a loud banter is the general outcome.

Their English teacher soon emerges out of the classroom door with stern eyes. She lectures the two about them being late and how disruptive they are being to the class, which awfully costs her mostly eight minutes of her class time. And due to Austin and Ally's bad behavior, the teacher sends them both to the Prefect's Office where they are supposed to stay until the English period is over.

Once they are a good distance away from the classroom, Austin bursts and blames their tardiness on Ally, which obviously angers the girl.

"This is all your fault!" Austin raises his voice.

"What—how is it my fault? And how dare you raise your voice on me?"

"Oh, so just because you're a high-ranked smartass student doesn't mean I can raise my voice on you?" Austin asks, towering over her in an attempt to make sure Ally knows which of them are more intimidating.

Ally shrinks back, her eyes averting away from Austin's hard glare. "It's not…like that." She mumbles almost to herself before heading to the direction of the Prefect's Office.

Austin stands there for at least ten seconds before realizing what he said probably affected Ally in a way that he won't understand…maybe not yet. He starts calling her name as he tries to catch up to her, but she won't even dare lift her head up. When he manages to keep up with her and matched his strides with her pace (which is kind of a struggle since he's so tall compared to Ally), he cautiously leans down to get a good look of her face.

"Ally?" He mutters, absently taking a few strands away from her face, revealing her cheeks that are somewhat wet. "Are you crying?"

"No, why would I be crying? I'm not that sensitive." She denies, but the crack in her voice gives all her act away.

"You know, you were never really the greatest liar I've ever known, and you still are." Austin says.

Ally ignores him.

"Come on, talk to me." Austin pleads. "Did I say something wrong?"

Ally stops from walking and cautiously faces Austin, looking up at him. Her glistening cheeks proved Austin's assumption about her crying. "Being a high-ranked student in this school comes with the inevitable popularity…and I never wanted that." That's all that she says before walking away, not giving any further explanation to her statement.

The whole time they are in the Prefect's Office, Austin and Ally remain silent excluding Ally's occasional sniffing. Austin hands her a box of tissue, and that's the only interaction that occurred between the two ever since they got in the office. When the prefect is called for an emergency meeting, she promises she'll be back in five minutes and reminds both Austin and Ally that no monkey business will be tolerated in her office.

The moment the prefect leaves the room; Austin makes it his sole mission to get Ally to talk to him. He coughs in order to get her attention.

"Um…I'm really sorry. I didn't know that it was a sensitive topic for you. I shouldn't have judged you like that." He pauses for a while, not really sure what else he's supposed to say. "I'm sorry. Again." He adds after.

"I overreacted, okay? You don't have to apologize." Ally's voice comes out raspy due to her not speaking for a long time.

The bell rings which means that the English period is over, so is Austin and Ally's time in the Prefect's Office. Since all that Ally ever want at the moment is to get out of that suffocating office, she walks out briskly, ignoring the fact that Austin is still on her tail.

"Ally! Hey, wait up!" He calls out, dodging all the augmenting students in the hallway.

It doesn't take him long to catch up to her, kudos to his long legs that he's so blessed to have. As soon as he's walking next to her, he says, "Thank you."

Ally looks up at him with her eyebrows knitting together in bafflement. "Huh? For what?" She inquires.

"For the guitar."

A smile quickly spreads across her face. "So you've already seen it, huh?" Ally asks even though it's a very rhetorical question.

"Yeah…and I don't like it."

Ally's smile drops. "Why not? It's the exact same guitar that broke yesterday! How could you not like it?" Bewildered by Austin's confession, she asks.

"I don't like it because it's not my guitar."

"I don't get you." She states, shaking her head at him incredulously.

"Of course, you won't. You're not the one with the broken guitar, and you're obviously not the one in a band."

"What does being in a band have to do with this?"

"My point exactly; you wouldn't understand."

Shaking her head, Ally starts walking to her next class not wanting to be late this time.

* * *

**Here are my comments from the reviews that I got:**

**#1: Brooke is not super psycho in this story, true, but all that I can say about that as of now is that, don't be too comfortable about her being calm yet.**

**#2: An egotistical jerk isn't really how I originally wrote Austin's character in this story. He's only acting like that towards Ally for A REASON. Hmmm, wonder what that is? I guess you just have to stay tuned to find out.**

**#3: Yes, it's okay to like Dallas. I know he's always the mean guy, but I'm changing him up a bit, so don't fret and feel weirded out if you're starting to actually like Dallas :)**

**So, that's the 3rd chapter for you all! Even though this one is probably going to be one of my favorite chapters, I still think it's kinda corny and cliché in a way. Don't you think?**

**Thanks again for the reviews and the favorites and the follows! :D**


	4. Chapter 4

**Okay, I've been reading reviews about Austin being a very bipolar person and how much of a jerk he's being. True, but give him a chance? He only has a couple of chapters left before he turns into the real Austin. Just be patient with him, okay? I feel like I'm talking to a baby or something because of how I'm saying this in my head right now. But anyway, ff . net had a few problems about letting me publish this chapter, but it's a good thing they decided to fix themselves up. **

**So I hope you'll enjoy this even though it's kind of short.**

* * *

**Chapter Four**

"Oh, gosh, why is she so freaking loud?" Ally groans as she throws her comforter off of her body before getting up and marching rather angrily down the stairs. She strides straight towards the kitchen where she could hear her cousin making noises due to some pans clashing and drawers closing.

She enters the kitchen and she immediately stops in her tracks. There is Austin, sitting on her favorite stool with his back on her, and is apparently munching on _her _favorite cereal. She doesn't even want Brooke eating it let alone Austin.

Ally's about to surprisingly strangle him from behind, but Brooke suddenly turns away from the stove and sees her.

"Well, look who's up." Brooke announces causing for Austin to turn around.

Ally points at Austin, keeping her eyes on Brooke. "What is he doing here? And why are you letting him eat my cereal?" She frankly asks.

"Why?" Austin answers. "Is your house now forbidden or something? And why can't I eat your cereal? In case you didn't know, this is my favorite."

"Who cares if it's your favorite? It's still _my _cereal, and _nobody _eats it except for _me_."

Austin picks his bowl up, stands up from the chair and stands intimidatingly in front of Ally like the way he did in school yesterday. Slowly, he spoons his cereal and mockingly savors it. He even makes sure Ally could hear the crunch as he chews.

Ally narrows her eyes at him and hisses, "I hate you so much."

"Oh, joy! The feeling is mutual."

"Okay, now you two, chill." Brooke decides to chirp in before anything gets worse. "Austin, sit down and finish your cereal. And as for you, Allison—" Austin snickers in the background—"Austin's only being nice."

"And how is he being nice? It's like what? Nine in the morning—"

"Ten, actually." Austin corrects.

"—Who cares what time it is anyway! You're already getting on my last nerve, mister."

"Come on, Ally. Austin wants to see a movie and he doesn't want to go alone. So, he came over to personally ask the both of us if we would want to come with him." Brooke says, taking the scrambled eggs out of the pan.

Ally turns to Austin as she places her hands on her hips. "Do you honestly think I'd agree to go and see a movie with you? Do you even remember how much of a douche you were being to me yesterday at school?" She queries angrily.

Austin swallows before answering, "It's not like I'm only asking the two of you. Of course my band will be coming. And Trish and Carrie too if you want."

"Of course, I know that." Ally responds, scoffing embarrassingly.

"So are you coming or what?"

"Who says I'm going when I know you're gonna be there as well?"

"Oh, so you're not?" Austin asks and then turns to Brooke. "Why are we still waiting for her then? Come on, let's go. We're only using my car so we still need to pick up the others."

"W-w-wait! I was only joking. Of course, I'm coming." Ally says, trailing after Austin and Brooke who already started heading for the door.

"But you said you're not."

"Oh Austin, can't you take a joke?"

"Well if you're coming, you better get ready. Clock is ticking."

* * *

Because Dez completely forgot about the message Austin sent him last night about his plan for the day (he wasn't in his and Austin's shared apartment last night), he isn't able to ride in the car with the rest.

Currently, the group is waiting outside Starbucks (Austin's request) for Dez to arrive.

"He said he's going to be here in five minutes!" Austin complained. "And how long have we been waiting? Thirty-five freaking minutes!"

Not long after Austin's complaint have been voiced out, a car stops right in front of Starbucks and out comes Dez. He innocently waves at his group of friends before catching up to them. He soon learns that they are all hungry, hence their rush.

"Okay, so where do you guys want to eat?" Dallas questions the group, facing them causing for him to walk backwards.

"Rooster's!" Ally suggested outrageously.

"Hey!" Dallas scolds. "Be quiet, young lady!"

Nobody says anything about Ally's suggestion since they are all too hungry to even voice out a single complaint. As the group start to head off to Rooster's, which is a barbecue and roast grill, everyone absentmindedly falls in pairs. Dallas goes with Ally, Carrie with Dez, Trish with Elliot, and then Austin and Brooke.

The latter pair is the "tail" ones, the pair that walks behind everyone. For that reason, Austin can't help but notice how much of a couple Dallas and Ally are acting. Dallas would constantly tickle Ally on her apparently ticklish side, and she'll flirt back by pinching his cheeks or punching his arm.

"Austin, are you okay?" Brooke suddenly questions.

"I could ask you the same thing." Austin replies having taken notice of how much Brooke is staring at Dallas and Ally.

"Huh? What are you talking about? Of course, I'm fine."

"I'm not quite sure about that; you look like something's bothering you."

Brooke contemplates whether it is safe to confide in Austin about his growing suspicions regarding Dallas and her beloved cousin. She takes Austin's feelings into consideration. He asked her out on a date, which obviously means the boy probably has a thing for her. But since Austin doesn't seem to be too forward with it at all, she's guessing he'll sooner lose interest. Setting that aside, she really has no one proper to talk to about her issue, so she ends up caving in anyway.

"Do you, by any chance, know something about Dallas and Ally?" Brooke asks.

Austin shakes his head. "Why would I?"

"You're one of Dallas's best friends and you're in a band with him. Don't you guys like talk about this kind of stuff?"

"Brooke, we're guys; we don't gossip like girls do."

"But does Dallas mentions Ally sometimes?"

"Sometimes?" Austin asks incredulously. "Are you kidding me? He talks about her _most _of the time!"

"Why?"

Austin shrugs. "He just says they have this 'attached-to-the-hip' kind of friendship. Honestly, Elliot and Dez are starting to think there's something more to it. But who can really tell? Dallas's getting kind of secretive lately." He explains.

"So is Ally."

* * *

"Hey, Ally, can I talk to you for a second?"

As she's about to grab the bathroom door's handle, Ally hears a voice behind her and she instantly turns around. She smiles when she sees Elliot standing awkwardly in front of the ladies' bathroom.

"Yeah, sure. What's up?"

"I'm not sure if I'm allowed to say this to you, but, Dez told me about you buying Austin a new guitar." Elliot starts, shoving his hands in his jeans' pocket.

Ally whines. "No, Elliot, not another lecture. I know it was a stupid idea and I could've used that thousand dollars on something else—"

"No, no, I promise this is a good thing." Elliot cuts her off. "As I was saying, when Austin talks to Dez, Dez talks to me. Apparently, Austin told Dez about what happened to you guys after lunch yesterday, and he also told me that Austin said he didn't like the guitar."

"Elliot, I need to go to the bathroom so bad. Is there anyway that you can get to the point?"

"Just don't tell Austin about this, okay? He actually _did _like the guitar; he just doesn't want to give you the satisfaction. Believe me, he has it in his hands as soon as he gets home from school. I'm starting to think he wants to be married to it." Elliot confesses.

Ally's eyebrows rise in surprise. "Oh, so that's how he wants to play, huh? You know, to be honest, Elliot, I always knew Austin doesn't really hate me that much."

Elliot nods. "You are actually right. He doesn't really hate you as much as the way he's showing it. I just don't get why he's still putting up this hate dilemma. And do you know what irritates me the most? He wouldn't even let us know why!"

"Well, I'll find out soon. I promise, I'll break him down. And I don't mean that in a bad way."

"You can do it, Ally; I know you can." Elliot starts to head back to their table before he turns around to add something, "Oh, and please don't forget to tell me what it is when you find out, okay?"

"I will, Elliot."

* * *

After Rooster's, the group goes to watch the movie Austin is so eager to see. Dallas just randomly hands out the movie tickets, ending up with Ally sitting in between him and Austin.

"Austin, move your gigantic legs away! You're hogging my personal space!" Ally angrily whispers once they all claim their seats and the theatre is already darkening.

"I'm sorry that I have such huge legs and I don't know where to place them!" Austin whispers back.

"Shhh! Could the two of you please behave just this one time?" Trish irritatingly says.

Halfway through the movie, Ally excuses herself to go to the bathroom once again. As she's standing up and bending down so she won't become a human giraffe to everyone else, Austin grabs her wrist and asks her where she's going.

"I'm going to the bathroom." She answers quietly.

"I'm coming with you. I need to buy some more popcorn anyway." He informs, standing up as well.

Once they are out of the theater, Ally heads straight to the ladies' bathroom while Austin claims a spot on the augmenting line at the snack bar. Ally comes out a few minutes later, but Austin is nowhere near the cashier yet. She stands next to him, which confuses the boy because she could have just gone back to the theatre and she didn't have to wait for him at all.

Austin opens his mouth to ask her about it, but is immediately cut off by her.

"Hey, can you buy me something? I promise I'll pay you back when I get home." Ally asks before mumbling lowly as if she's talking to herself, "Gosh, I have so much debts now."

"And tell me one legitimate reason why I should spend my money on you." Austin instructs, crossing his arms over his chest.

Ally whines, tilting her head back. "I bought you that two-thousand dollar guitar remember?"

Austin sighs and looks up at the ceiling as though he's contemplating whether he should buy Ally something or not. Finally, he looks back down at her and says, "Fine, what do you want?"

"I want popcorn, specifically large because Elliot completely snatched mine away from me." Ally answers excitingly. "And I still don't know how he managed to do that since he's like a gazillion seats away from me."

"You should never really underestimate Elliot's capabilities." Austin answers just as it's finally his turn to order.

After getting their large popcorns (Austin with butter and Ally with cheese), they start heading back to the theater. Surprisingly, none of them are in a hurry; and since their theatre is all the way at the very back of the movie house, they had plenty of time for a small conversation.

And that's exactly what Ally had in mind.

"Are we friends now, Austin Monica?" She teases.

"No." Austin answers instantly.

"Why not? Don't you notice how unusually nice you're being to me lately?"

Austin shrugs. "I don't even know why I'm being unnaturally nice to you; trust me." He answers, shoving a handful of popcorn in his mouth.

"Can I ask you something?"

"You were already asking me questions a while ago, so why the hell not?"

Ally clears her throat. "What is it with me that just completely angers you? I've been noticing lately how when you're around Elliot or Dallas or Dez or basically everyone in our group, you're all nice and chirpy; but once I get in the picture, you're suddenly turning into a completely different person. It's like there's a 'band Austin' and then there's an 'Ally Austin.' You get what I mean?"

"You want the truth?"

Ally nods.

"We've only been hanging out with the same group of people for only a year, and I honestly think that you're a bitch. The type of girl that only cares about her standards in school. And then that English dilemma happened yesterday and I realized that maybe you're not really as bitchy as I thought you are."

"Then why do you still hate me…if you said that I'm not that bitchy?"

"You're lacking something," Austin ventures. "In order to be considered as Austin Moon's friend, you have to prove something to me that will convince me that you are worthy of my time and trust. And Ally, you are slacking."

Ally's mouth hangs open in incredulity. "Are you—you're joking right?" She asks as soon as she recovers.

"Do I look like I'm joking?" Austin asks before reaching for theater twelve's handle bars and opening it up. And since he has this hate thing going on with Ally, he disregards all acts of being a proper gentleman.

"I can't believe you, Austin. You are _so_ out of your mind." Ally mumbles as she silently follows him back to their seats.

* * *

**BEFORE YOU SAY ANYTHING, I just want to inform you that that is NOT the real reason why Austin hates Ally. I promise someday he's going to reveal it. You just have to wait for it.**

**Let me know what you think! And thank you all for the reviews, keep 'em coming!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Posting this rather than writing my argumentative essay that is actually due by tomorrow! Yeaaaahhh! I finished this early and I honestly couldn't wait for Saturday because of how excited you guys are about the next chapter. I'm excited about it too, don't worry. Anyway, this might still be a little short but I promise I'll try to make the future chapters longer for the sake of your satisfaction.**

**So, I hope you'll enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

**Chapter Five**

Opening her curtained sliding doors, Ally steps out to the veranda attached to her bedroom with her camera in hand. She enjoys taking pictures and she considers it as her hobby. Whenever she feels bored or whenever she misses her parents, whose flight back to Miami is still unknown, she steps out there and just takes photos of everything she finds interesting. Often times she surprises herself of the things she manages to catch with her camera.

Frankly, the thing—or the _people_—that catches her interest on a very cozy Saturday are the boys of Austin's band. She looks down at Dallas's roofless convertible as she hears him honking at Austin and Dez (Ally lives three apartments away from the said boys).

"All right, Dallas, you interest me today so I'm going to take a picture of you no matter how stalker-like I sound." Ally mumbles to herself, lifting the camera to her face and focuses the lens on Dallas's face, as the said boy continues honking.

As soon as the camera lens finally focuses, Austin and Dez emerge from their apartments, Dez shooing Elliot away from the front seat as Austin hops inside Dallas's car improperly, jumping over the door rather than opening it.

Ally clicks the shutter button. A smile is plastered on her face as she clicks on a button to preview the picture she recently took, but she's taken aback by how it turned out. Instead of capturing Dallas's face, she accidentally took one of Austin's. She thinks that it's probably because of the fact that Austin went for the seat behind Dallas, and as he's jumping over the car door, Austin blocks Dallas's face just in time for her to click the shutter.

Her thumb graces over the delete button, and when the confirmation message comes up, she hesitates for a second before canceling. Looking at Austin's unintentional photograph once again, Ally studies it closely. She rolls her eyes at the fact that Austin is wearing that black beanie _again_, and the sunglasses too. She takes note of how his right dimple appears (its appearance is a rare occurrence to Ally as he's always frowning when she's around) as he sticks his tongue out, probably making weird faces with Elliot.

As Dallas's car revs up rather loudly, Ally switches her camera off before turning to her heels to head back inside; completely missing the fact that a certain boy sitting in the backseat turns his head and looks up at her balcony.

* * *

"Picking us up and not telling us where we're going?" Dez says as he shoos Elliot away from the front seat. "Not cool, man."

"Why are you all so eager to know?" Dallas questions back, laughing. Apparently, even before he went to pick up Austin and Dez, Elliot had already asked him the same question.

"Because unlike you, we actually want to know our destination. Who knows where you might take us." Austin answers, jumping over the car door and fixing his hair and beanie once he's comfortably seated and buckled up.

"Oh, so I'm a psychopath now? Geez, guys, thank you so much." Dallas replies sarcastically, revving his engine up. "Well, since all of your persistence are starting to weird me out, we're going to the new bowling and arcade center near our school. Do you trust me now, kids?"

"Yes, Dallas." Austin, Dez, and Elliot simultaneously reply with a child-like voice.

Before Dallas steps on the accelerator, Austin absently turns his head and looks up at Ally's veranda, catching sight of the girl before she completely disappears into her bedroom.

* * *

The four boys arrive at the newly opened bowling and arcade center twenty minutes from Austin and Dez's neighborhood. Upon entering, Dallas basically just speaks for everyone else in the band when he voices out his reaction to the place.

"We are so making this our territory." Dallas says, hinting to his friends that he has found their new hangout spot. They used to chill at the mall's food court, and after having tried out every single meal the fast-food chains had to offer, the four of them are getting sick of it.

"We can finally ditch that crappy seats and tables at the mall's food court." Elliot mumbles in response, still at awe at their newfound hangout spot.

The center is nowhere near what any of them expected. It's bigger than every bowling place they have ever been to, and the alleys are lined up with neon lights that automatically flashes in different colors when the pins get all knocked down. The place is also lined with numerous small food franchises that have nothing similar to the ones the mall has to offer. The place also has its own arcade area, which is the main purpose of the second floor.

After recovering from their awestruck states, the four boys decide to claim _their _table and eat something first since it's almost lunchtime.

"I don't know about the three of you, but I'm dying to try that pizza stand right there. I haven't heard of that brand ever before." Elliot announces as he gets up from his chair and excitingly makes his way to the said franchise.

"I think I'll go with Elliot." Dez says. He as well stands up from his chair and hurries to catch up with his friend.

"I might go for that Mexican thing over there." Dallas later informs, pointing with his lip towards the mini-Mexican restaurant located by the entrance of the bowling alley.

Austin nods before he stands up from his chair, having an idea already on what he's going to try out for the first time.

* * *

After everyone comes back from buying their lunches, Austin, Elliot, Dez, and Dallas all fall silent, each indulged into their own food. Elliot would let out a satisfied moan with every five bites of his three pizzas, so does Dez. Dallas is only quiet due to the fact that the meal he bought contains too much spices that he's eager to finish it all off before his tongue have the chance to completely burn off. And Austin, well, he's just normally quiet.

"Hey," Dez attempts to start a conversation, having enough of the unnatural silence between the four of them, "I've been meaning to ask the three of you about something, but I never really got around it."

"What is it?" Dallas questions in between sips of his ice-cold water.

Dez rubs the back of his neck, an old nervous habit of his that he can't seem to get rid of. He puts his pizza down on the paper plate before looking at his friends individually.

"What do you guys think of Trish?" Dez finally lets out.

"You mean, Ally's Trish?" Elliot asks to clarify.

Dez only manages to nod.

"Well, honestly, I think she's a good catch." Dallas answers. "Why do you ask? Do you like her?"

"I think so." Dez replies, picking his plastic cup up and taking a sip of his soda.

"I say you should go after her. More reason for us to hang out with Ally's group!" Dallas exclaims gleefully, finally done with his spicy lunch.

"Since Dez brought up the girl talk, I want to ask something too." Elliot informs promptly. "We now know that Dallas thinks Trish is a good catch for Dez, how about Carrie?"

"Carrie?" Austin asks with his eyebrows furrowing. "I'm not intending this in a bad way, but doesn't she sometimes get a little too feisty? And then other times when she's not, she's kind of like an excited puppy? Almost like a little girl sometimes."

"So is she a good choice or not?" Elliot responds.

"Personally, I think she's great. She's honestly one of the girls I'm grateful I'm friends with." Dez candidly voices out.

"Good to know because we're already dating."

"What?" Austin, Dez, and Dallas simultaneously shout in surprise.

"We've been going out for a month now actually."

Because Dallas and Dez are still incapable of speaking, Austin senses that it's now his responsibility to speak not only for himself, but also for his other two friends as well. "And how come you never told us about this?" He inquires.

Elliot shrugs. "Carrie wants to keep it a secret. The two of us are quite a peculiar match obviously, so we decided that before we officially broadcast it to our friends, we both want to know if we're really going to work out. And if we managed to last at least two months, then that's are cue to tell everyone." He explains.

"Does Ally know?" Austin asks again.

"Haven't you been listening to me, Austin?"

"Dude, she's going to kill you. Keeping a secret like that to her? That's a big no-no; you're sentencing yourself to death."

Elliot does not respond after that, knowing well enough that Ally's too good of a citizen to even consider murdering a friend.

As if the bombs Dez and Elliot had dropped without forewarning aren't enough to fire up the day, Dallas decide it's also the perfect moment to drop the remaining one.

"Like Elliot said, now that we're having the girl talk, I have something to say myself." Dallas starts. "I'm planning to get Ally back."

Hearing that, Austin puts his food down and clears his throat, his expression looking all focused as Dallas talks about his plan on getting the girl back. Austin doesn't know why he's suddenly acting that way, but because he's been hanging out with Ally regularly for the past few weeks, he's seen some vulnerability in her that he fails to take note of before. And he feels the need to protect that fragile piece of her. He doesn't exactly know when and why he started caring, but all that Austin knows is that his sense of protectiveness is just suddenly…there. It's very out of the blue.

"Get her back? Did you two dated?" Austin inquires.

Since Dallas and Ally's relationship was kept a secret, no one really ever knew about it, even the other three members of the band. As in, _no one _really knew. What everyone thought was that Dallas and Ally just has that kind of "attached-to-the-hip" kind of friendship.

Dallas freezes in his seat, but composes himself quickly. "No," he lies. "No, we've never dated, but Ally and I were both aware of our feelings for one another. She wasn't allowed to have a boyfriend before so she rejected me for the past year. And now, I'm in year twelve, she's in year eleven, I just felt like her feelings for me aren't kind of there anymore. And I'm scared that she'll fall for someone else. I mean I waited for her for a long time and I just won't allow it if ever she won't give us a chance." Dallas internally gives himself a rightful pat on the back for his white lie. It feels so surreal that even he kind of believes that that is really what happened with his relationship with Ally.

"I know I sound so possessive, but I really like Ally and I don't want her to just pass me by." Dallas adds as he takes another sip of his drink.

Soon, everyone finishes their lunches and they head off to grab their bowling shoes. Austin occasionally space out for seconds thinking about what he just learned about Dallas and Ally's past relationship, and Dez willingly takes the evident responsibility to snap him out of it once in a while.

* * *

Ally enters her bedroom, still feeling a bit peculiar about her recent photo. It's a very small thing that doesn't really deserve that much attention, but for some reason, she can't shake off what she feels about it.

_It's just a picture of Austin_, she keeps telling herself, _he's not going to feel awkward with it in the case that he finds out I have that picture. Besides, he's a friend of mine, even though I'm not to him, and it's normal for a friend to have a picture of her friend, right? But my case with Austin is kind of different, so is it still normal for me to have that picture?_

Ally shakes her head to steer off her thoughts. She sets her camera down on her bedside table before realizing that Brooke is in her room, rummaging through her vanity.

"Brooke, what are you doing?" Ally asks.

The said girl cautiously turns her head to look at her cousin with alarming eyes. She stops her outrageous searching and stands up straight. "I was wondering if I could borrow your strawberry lip-gloss, you know the sparkly ones?" Brooke purposely describes the one Ally uses very often so her rummaging would make sense.

Completely unbeknownst to Ally, Brooke is actually looking for any kind of sign regarding Dallas and her cousin's relationship. Ever since the group went to see that movie at the mall last weekend, Brooke has grown very suspicious about the two because how they are acting seems to be something only a couple would do. Friends don't do what Dallas and Ally do, so Brooke sets a personal mission for herself to investigate about the two's relationship. And Brooke thinks that the best way to get a clue is to go through Ally's stuff. Unfortunately, she's not finding anything useful.

"Oh, I decided to change my backpack, so the lip-gloss might still be on my previous one." Ally says. "I can't remember where I put it though. I just kind of threw it randomly on the floor last night."

Brooke is secretly thankful of the fact that she actually has to _search_ for Ally's backpack. In that way, she'll have more reason to get her hands on her cousin's stuff.

As Ally heads inside her bathroom, Brooke happens to eye Ally's backpack lying on the floor, almost under the bed in fact. She bends down to pick it up; but just when she's about to open the backpack, she decides it won't hurt if she takes a peek a little more under the bed. That's when she sees a very familiar t-shirt and a picture frame. She's sure she could see Ally's face on it, but not the person who has his arm around her shoulders (it's very obvious the arm belongs to a guy).

"Did you find it?" Ally suddenly comes out of her bathroom, just as Brooke is about to reach for the shirt and the picture frame.

Brooke straightens up, raises the backpack and flashes her cousin a forced smile. "Yep, found it." She answers, shoving her hand inside and immediately grabs ahold of the lip-gloss. She raises it as well. "Oh, and look! I found the lip-gloss too!"

"Just don't forget to return it when you're done. That's my favorite."

After, Brooke hurriedly walks out of Ally's room, thanking her along the way, with another new goal set in her mind: she has to get that picture and shirt no matter what it takes.

* * *

**I did warn you about Brooke, didn't I?**

**Anyway, I need some help. I can't think of a name for Austin's band in this story, that's why I kept referring to them as "Austin's band." Can you guys help me come up with a name? The winner will be announced on the next chapter, and then I'll also announce the prize :D**

**Thank you!**


	6. Chapter 6

**YAY! NEW UPDATE! It was a fun thing reading all your reviews. I also like all of your band name suggestions, and I know I said I'm going to announce the winner when I update, but I may need some more time deciding which one I would like to use for Austin's band. So, watch out for that when I finally announce it. Who knows? Maybe your suggestion won?**

**Anyway, I hope you'll enjoy this because I did when I was writing this.**

* * *

**Chapter Six**

Tuesday after school, Austin reaches the bottom of the stairs when he eyes Ally walking towards the lobby. He yells out her name instantaneously catching the girl's attention. Ally waits for Austin to catch up to her, and once he does, she grins up at him. Austin absolutely hates it when she does that. He doesn't know why, but he just does.

"Dallas told me he won't be able to take you home today." Austin informs Ally tediously.

"Oh, well; I guess it's another one of those cab days for me then." Charlie replies with a sigh, not really intending to sound disappointed.

Austin tilts his head to the side. "You sound so upset. Did you and Dallas make plans?" He inquires. Austin almost wants to take his question back because of the fact that he doesn't like Ally; the query is very unlike him.

"No, we didn't plan anything. I just thought…" Ally puffs out a breath. "I just thought that…you know what? Never mind. Forget I said anything."

Austin nods. "Well, anyway. As much as I don't want to, Dallas kindly asked me to be the one to take you home…at least just for today." He notifies keeping his eyes on Ally as he eagerly awaits her reaction.

"What's in it for you?" She solidly asks.

"What do you mean?"

"Austin, for the past few weeks, you've made it clear that you hate me down to your very soul. I even started to think that you'd drown me in a sea of acid if given any chance. Obviously, you're not going to agree to do anything that involves me, so I'm pretty sure Dallas bribed you. How much is it for?" Ally explains, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Not a single deal nor handshake occurred, Ally. You know how Dallas is. He always has this look that he gives when he wants a person to agree to something he said. Or he uses it to his advantage when he wants an impossible favor…an excellent example for that would be this one."

Ally looks at him for a while, attempting to find any signs that would give away Austin's pretense. But after a while, she realizes that the boy is serious about taking her home so she gives in.

"I'm pretty sure you know where I live." Ally mutters, turning to her heels and leading her and Austin to the parking lot.

Much to her surprise, Austin recites her address in one swift breath.

"Wow; stalker much, Austin Monica?"

* * *

Once Austin drops Ally off at her apartment, she immediately heads in and searches for Brooke.

"Brooke! Are you home?" She calls out, her voice echoing around the spacious apartment.

When she hears no answer, she calls out again, thinking Brooke might just be in the bathroom. Her cousin likes to play her music on full volume when she's taking her shower. Often times it's a problem for the both of them as Brooke never really hears what Ally tells her when she's in the shower (like when she wants to borrow her hairdryer or her hair straightener).

"Brooke—" Ally stops yelling out her cousin's name when she sees that their telephone light is blinking. She strides towards it before pressing the button and a voicemail from Brooke comes up.

_Hey, Ally. I just called to tell you that I won't be home for tonight, but apparently, you aren't home yet. Anyway, like I said, I won't be there for tonight. I'm staying over at my friend's house since we don't really have school tomorrow due to that sophomore thing going on. I'm really sorry that I'm leaving you alone for tonight. I feel terrible so I'm letting you use the money I'm saving in a jar in the kitchen. If you want pizza, use it—_

The voicemail beeps, signaling that Brooke's message has been cut off due to its length.

Ally sighs, crestfallen. She's actually planning on having a girls' night with her cousin and just talk about stuff since they haven't been doing that lately anymore. Also, Brooke still has some explaining to do regarding her "dinner date" with Austin two weeks ago!

With one last huff of breath, she heads up to her room and change into her black running shorts and athletic hooded jacket. She also laces up her running shoes, thinking that all she needs at the moment is a quick run to clear her mind. Since she found out that she's going solo for the night, she's stressing about what she's going to cook for dinner, or how scared she's going to be when she wakes up somewhere around past midnight and remembers she's completely alone in the house. She usually stresses about unnecessary things, and that is what Ally hates about her the most. She's paying most attention to those who need little of it.

Ally's supposed run though turns out to be just a brisk walk, which weirdly ends outside Austin's apartment door. She rings his doorbell, and that's about where she realizes where she is and what she's done. And it's too late to back out as Austin is already opening his door.

* * *

After dropping Ally off, Austin enters his apartment and sees a note that's being held up in place with a magnet on the fridge. He runs his tongue over his upper front teeth as he takes the note and reads it quickly.

_I'm staying at my family's house for tonight until tomorrow. You have the place all to yourself mate. And you know what that means? NO PARTYING! What's a party without its actual life anyway, right? – Dez_

Austin chuckles, crumpling the note and throwing it to the trash bin. He pulls out his phone from his jeans' back pocket and dials Dez's number. The latter boy immediately picks up.

"Seriously, Dez, what were you thinking when you were writing this note? You do know you could've just called me and told me over the phone, right?" Austin says right off the bat.

"I saw you leaving school with Ally a while ago, and I just kind of assumed that you're off to somewhere with her. I didn't really want to be a disruption." Dez responds.

"We weren't going anywhere. Dallas was supposed to take her home, but since he's been very busy with the senior stuff lately, he asked me to drive Ally home. Apparently, her goddamn car was delayed for another week, so it's not like I have any other choice." Austin says as he puts the phone on speaker to shrug his thin cardigan off leaving him in a simple gray t-shirt.

"All right," Dez replies, "but remember what I said about throwing a party—"

"Hang on a second, Dez." Austin interrupts as he hears the doorbell ringing.

Austin rushes to the door and opens it, only to reveal a very surprised Ally standing outside. Her expression resembles a deer in the headlights.

"Ally?"

"I—I'm sorry. I don't even know why I'm here; I'm just going to leave. I'm sorry if I caused any trouble or disruption or anything." Ally rambles, saying she'll leave but not making an effort to really _leave_.

Austin shakes his head. "No, it's fine. You didn't interrupt anything. Actually, I was talking to Dez and—oh shoot! Ally, come inside real quick!" He says as he impatiently grabs Ally by her wrist and pulls her quite harshly inside his apartment.

His sudden pulling causes for Ally to unintentionally bury her face in Austin's chest for a brief second. Lucky for her, the boy is unaware of their fortuitous close proximity.

"Wait, Austin, what is it?" Ally asks out of slight panic.

"It's those group of boys again." Austin mumbles as he subtly peeks through one of the vertical windows lining his front door.

"What about them?" She asks, peeking out as well with her head just below Austin's.

"I've seen them walk around this neighborhood quite often, and they're always up to no good. Remember the other night when there were a bunch of police cars by the playground?" When Ally nods, Austin continues, "Apparently, they attempted to set the whole playground on fire; I think they were going for lighting the entire park actually. Someone caught them though and the police luckily came on time."

"That's quite dumb, don't you think? Setting the playground on fire. I don't see any point in doing so."

"They're quite deranged as I have heard." Austin answers finally pulling away from the window, remembering that Dez is probably still on the line. He picks his phone up, and just assumed, the boy still is.

"Who was that?" Dez asks.

"I'm sorry I forgot you, Dez. It was Ally who was at the door, and we got distracted with the delinquents. They're roaming around our neighborhood again." Austin answers.

Delinquents are what Dez and Austin calls the said gang of boys.

"Oh, really? I thought they were put to jail after the attempted playground stunt?"

"I guess they're not." Austin shrugs even though he's aware Dez won't be able to see him.

"By the way, what is Ally doing there?" Dez questions.

Austin can easily hear the teasing tone in his friend's voice.

"She said she doesn't know; she just rang my doorbell for no reason."

"Did you let her in though? Or did you abandon her outside?" Dez teases, knowing how much Austin hates Ally.

Austin scoffs, glancing over his shoulder to check on Ally. "I could've done that, but—"

"You're worried the delinquents would do something to her?"

"She looks like she's going for a run, and I don't really want her to go by herself. Who knows what those delinquents are capable of doing to her?"

"Wow, is Austin Monica Moon actually caring for our little Ally? I thought you're hooking up with her cousin?" Dez teases in a little girl's voice.

"Shut up, Dez. I'm only doing this because of those stupid delinquents, okay? And I never said I'm dating Brooke, I only said I _think _I like her." Austin responds, whispering the last part of his sentence, careful not to let Ally hear him.

"Whatever you say, Austin. I guess I'll just have to ignore the fact that you once asked Brooke out to dinner." Dez says, giggling.

"Dez, I swear, if you don't stop talking—"

"All right, I got to go. I'll see you on Thursday, I guess."

After Austin says his goodbye, he hangs up his phone and places it back on his jeans' pocket. He swivels around and panics when he doesn't see Ally standing where he last saw her. He's kind of hoping that she didn't hear his conversation with Dez, but at the same time, he's worried that she heard and decided to leave because of how much of a jerk he sounded.

Out of panic, he calls out Ally's name alarmingly.

"Geez, Austin Monica! Don't fret, I'm in your living room." Ally answers before quickly being followed by, "Aw, Dez looks so adorable in this picture! Makes me want to reach out and squish his adorable little face."

Austin runs to the living room to find Ally looking at pictures of Dez when he's younger. Austin had once advised Dez not to display those pictures as they only suggests freedom of affronts. It's almost like Dez is begging to be insulted.

"He's one adorable kid, isn't he?" Austin comments as he stands beside Ally. Too close actually, something the hateful Austin won't approve of.

A simple hum is what Ally is able to respond with as her eyes gaze through every photos of little Dez. She smiles when she sees the one of Dez when he was celebrating his fifth birthday. The party hat was resting on the side of his head with traces of chocolate ice cream trickling down the corner of his mouth. His cheeks were so puffy as his smile was exaggeratingly wide and very adorable.

Austin suddenly feels uncomfortable with the deafening silence transpiring between him and Ally. Even though he wants to give her a few more minutes to browse through Dez's embarrassing childhood pictures (in Austin's opinion anyway), he wants to talk to Ally and clarify a couple of things regarding her being in his apartment.

"Hey…uh, Ally?" Austin mumbles clearing his throat soon after realizing his voice came out raspy.

"Hmm?"

"I just got off the phone with Dez and he found out you're here. I just want to clarify that we're not going to—"

"What? Are girls not allowed in your apartment now? Last time I checked, it's still very legal. Trust me, I've lost count of how many had came in and out through that very door since I moved in with Brooke." Ally intervenes, a foolish smile spreading across her face.

"Hey!" Austin abruptly snaps. "Dez and I only brought a total of four girls here!"

"Four for each?"

"No! What do you think I am?"

"I'm just joking, Austin. Geez, loosen up once in a while, will ya?"

Austin narrows his eyes at her before shaking his head, chuckling unbelievably. "Screw you and this being polite crap." He says, throwing his hands up in the air as if he's surrendering.

"Being polite? How are you exactly being polite right now?"

"I was about to ask you if you want to stay for a while as long as those delinquents are still outside, but I guess I'm not in the mood for that crap now."

"You still hate me, huh, Austin?" Ally questions, crossing her arms over her chest while her jaw tightens.

"Now that you're mentioning it; yeah, I still pretty much hate you. The thing that happened in the movie theater last weekend, it didn't change anything, Ally." Austin harshly informs, his tone of voice strong with distaste.

"I didn't even do anything to you for you to hate me this much, Austin!" Ally raises her voice. Her fingers curl wickedly, and it's just itching to strangle Austin on the spot but she holds herself back. "I literally can't believe you and your crappy attitude. I don't even care anymore if I'm going to be spending the night alone in my apartment with those delinquents lurking around. I'm leaving."

With that, Ally marches off angrily towards the front door. Once she steps outside and makes sure she slams the door with just enough force to show Austin how furious she is, Austin realizes what she just said and immediately runs after her. He sees her not far away from his apartment (much to his relief) and sprints towards her. He grabs her by her knees and casually throws her over his shoulder without warning.

As a result, Ally lets out an ear-shattering scream.

"Let me go, you dumbass!" She kicks at his stomach, she punches his back, but the boy is too strong. "I said, let me go!" Ally resumes fighting her way out of Austin's grasp.

Thinking that Ally may be thinking that the person holding her is one of the delinquents, Austin struggles to keep at least one of her leg in its calm state, and when he succeeds such task, he pinches her the way he normally does: two pinches, one poke, and then another set of two pinches.

Ally recognizes the familiar pattern in an instant, but having the knowledge that Austin and not one of the delinquents are currently carrying her, she decides it's still a good idea to fight her way out of Austin's strong grip on her. Besides, she doesn't want to let this opportunity to physically hurt Austin pass her by.

They head back inside Austin's apartment and he finally sets her down.

"Welcome back, Ally." Austin greets, panting.

Ally is also struggling to regain her breath. Apparently, her attempts to break free from Austin's grasp are a form of cardiovascular exercise. She angrily fixes her hooded jacket and her disheveled ponytail.

"What were you thinking? I totally thought you were one of the delinquents!" Ally exclaims, following Austin wherever he goes in his apartment.

When Austin steps inside the living room, Ally still trailing behind him, he stalks over to his DVD rack and squats in front of it. He runs his finger through every DVD case before glancing at Ally over his shoulder, a teasing smirk playing upon his pinkish lips.

"Want to watch a movie? I've got quite an interesting collection." Austin asks, completely ignoring Ally's frustrated question.

"Did you just seriously ask that after all that you've done to me for the past 20 minutes?"

Austin shrugs. "I'm telling you, you might be missing out on a few golden movies. Dez's been saving up some of the popcorn on the back of the pantry. You can eat that if you want. I mean I'm not the one who's gonna be at fault here anyway." He says, taking his chosen movie out of the rack.

"Technically, you're still going to be at fault. You're the one who told me to eat it in the first place." Ally informs, her anger uncommonly slowly easing off.

"Just shut up and get some popcorn popping."

When Ally comes in to the kitchen, she eyes a sheet of paper lying on the countertop. She picks it up and reads that it's a recipe for baking cookies. She chuckles to herself and yells at Austin, asking, "Hey, what's this recipe for? We're you trying to make cookies before I rang the doorbell?"

"That's not mine! Dez's been feeling like a pro chef these past few days and he must've left that recipe there."

"Oh, can I make it?" Ally asks hopefully.

"No, Ally, just leave Dez's recipe alone!"

"Okay, fine, I will." Ally replies as she walks to the pantry to retrieve the bag of popcorn Dez is apparently saving up for some reason. She places it on the microwave and sets the timer on. Once it is finally done, Ally takes it out of the microwave and loudly curses as the bag burns a couple of her fingers.

"You're not supposed to touch the bag right after it's done, you know?" Austin shouts from the living room.

"I'm aware, Austin Monica!" Ally sheepishly retorts.

Soon after, she hears Austin mumbling something rather loudly to his self. She knows it's about her but she ignores it, thinking there's no point in making a big deal out of it. It's not like it's the first time Austin did it.

When the popcorn finally cools down, Ally pours it in a bowl and takes it with her to the living room, which Austin had completely transformed into a sort of bedroom-like room.

"Tada!" He says childishly as he gestures at the couch that apparently can turn into a bed, as well as a couple of cozy, big blankets. He reasons that Ally may be that type of girl who likes to wrap herself up with the blanket during a movie (no matter what temperature it is).

Much to Ally's surprise, he's right about his assumption. She proudly calls it being a burrito.

"So…what movie did you put in?" Ally questions after finding her comfortable spot on the sofa bed and had wrapped herself up with one of the blankets Austin took out.

Austin gives Ally a sideway glance before smirking knowingly.

"Well? Aren't you going to tell me? Here's an Ally fact for the day: I don't like watching a movie without actually knowing what it _is._" She informs, her arms struggling to find a hole that she could fit her hands into in order to grab some popcorn from the bowl.

"Be patient, Ally. It's gonna come up, and when it does, you'll instantly recognize it." Austin answers.

Ally sends a playful glare at the side of his head before turning her attention to the TV. When the movie finally starts and it shows that Austin had put in _Shrek_, Ally looks at him with complete disbelief evident in her expression.

Austin notices it.

"What? You don't like Shrek? I thought everybody likes it."

"I do like Shrek, but really?"

"If you like it then why are you still talking and not watching?"

"Sassy Austin, I like it." Ally comments as she wraps herself up even more with the blanket and shoves her hand inside the popcorn bowl.

* * *

Aware of the fact that Ally is currently in Austin's apartment—thanks to her sources—Brooke quickly drives back to her shared apartment with Ally and hastily rummages through her cousin's stuff once again. She's hoping that Ally didn't do any cleaning during the weekends or else she's doomed. Brooke checks under the bed again and as if the odds are in her favor, the shirt and the picture are still there. She reaches for it, and what she sees is something she never expects.

"What the f…"

The t-shirt is the pony shirt that Dallas loves to wear. "It's my favorite," he once mentioned the last time she saw him wearing it. The group was scheduled to meet at the school's courtyard and all their mouths went agape upon laying their eyes on Dallas strutting across the lawn, the pony shirt dignifying him even more rather than embarrassing him.

Dallas has indicated multiple times in school about how he lost his pony shirt and he misses it so much. What confuses Brooke very much is how did it get under Ally's bed? She doesn't want to think of _that_, so she concludes that the best way to find out is to bring the shirt back to Dallas and ask him how it ended up being under her cousin's bed.

"Let's see if you can lie through this, Dallas Erwin." Brooke mumbles, putting the shirt down on the floor and picking up the picture frame.

Brooke's eyes open wide when she sees that it's a picture of Ally and Dallas. Ally is laughing (probably because Dallas was telling her a lame joke during that time) as Dallas is smiling and nuzzling his face in the crook of her neck. Brooke takes note that the photo appears to be taken with a Polaroid, so she takes it out of the frame in hopes that either Ally or Dallas wrote a caption on it.

With much luck, Dallas did. Brooke recognizes his sloppy yet understandable handwriting.

_Happy 1__st__ anniversary, babe. 09/15/12_.

Brooke's mouth hangs in open in surprise, taken aback by the fact that Dallas and Ally had already been in a relationship for almost two years!

Out of anger, Brooke takes the picture and the shirt before storming out of Ally's room and angrily marching down the stairs. She wants answers, and the answer is what she's going to get.

* * *

**There's Chapter 6 for you guys! I hope it's long enough. If not, well, I tried. But anyway, let me know what you think about this.**

**THANK YOU ALL FOR THE LOVELY REVIEWS! KEEP 'EM COMING!**


	7. Chapter 7

**So, it's like 11:31pm here in Utah, and I have school tomorrow. I know I should be sleeping by now, but can't wait to update this. Also, I want to answer a couple of questions/reviews that I received from the previous chapter, you know, just wanna clear things up.**

**Guest - It's called "Ally's Song" for a reason. I promise, it's going to make sense soon. Don't really want to hint too much, but it's probably going to come up by around Chapter 9 or 10-ish? But anyway, it's gonna come sooner :)**

**helloraura123 - No, dear, it's not said that you've read all of my other stories in less than half a day. If you must know, I am so addicted with fan fictions (especially during summer) I could finish at least 4-5 books in one day.**

**So, that's probably it. Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 7**

"Attention all club members, please report to the main gym immediately. Once again, all club members please report to the main gym immediately."

Ally groans as the intercom announced the unanticipated meeting. She's actually on her way to the parking lot, ready to end the school day and just flunk in her bed. She's already having a bad day, and she's nowhere near interested into what the meeting's agenda will be about. But since she's the president of the Theatre Club, she has no choice but to attend.

She tiresomely enters the main gym, instantly eyeing all of her theatre people sitting in one group. She strides toward them and smiles when Sarah, one of her club members, grins up at her and makes room for Ally to sit on. As soon as she settles down, her eyes accidentally lands on the four boys entering the main gym while the head coordinator of the assembly taps the microphone to check if it's working.

"What the heck are they doing here?" Ally tells Sarah. "They're not even members of any club."

Sarah shrugs, pouting her lips. "Who knows? Maybe they are." She replies.

Ally raises her eyebrows at her friend. "Them? Are you serious? Dallas, Elliot, Dez, and Austin being members of a club?" She questions in disbelief.

"Well…maybe they established their own club?"

Ally opens her mouth to say something when the coordinator clears her throat, silencing the entire gym. She smiles at the students as the four boys finally claim their seats at the very top of the bleachers.

"I gathered you all of you here to discuss about our upcoming annual Reach Out Program. For the students who had been previously involved in this event, you know what it's already about. For the new people, the Reach Out Program is an event Marino High holds annually. The chosen representatives go to the year's chosen charity and offer community service for three Saturdays. Last year, we had it during December as a Christmas program, but this year, we are having it before the spring break." The head coordinator explains, eyeing a few students as she goes on.

"Due to the numerous clubs in Marino High, and the school is only allowed to take limited number of students, not everyone will have the opportunity to attend the event. Despite that, I still want to clarify some ground rules in the case that you are chosen to be a representative…" then she continues on with reciting all the rules regarding the said program.

Ally looks up at the top of the bleachers and unintentionally catches Austin and Dallas's attention; she raises a hand to wave at them. Originally, she's waving at Austin but Dallas mistakes it as something directed to him, so he waves back. After concealing her laughter because of Dallas's misassumption, she turns her attention to Austin but it seems like he's lost interest and decides to ignore Ally.

"Now that all of you are already informed about the rules, you have the rest of the time to meet up with your club and talk about which member you would want to be a representative for the Reach Out Program." The coordinator announces, stepping away from the microphone to supervise the students while they talk amongst their club members.

"Okay; first, we should nominate a few members and then let's vote from there." Ally starts once all of her theatre people are already gathered.

"How about you, Miss President?" One of the theatre people tells Ally, a playful smile spreading across his features.

Ally immediately shakes her head. "Oh, no; please, no. I was already a representative last year, it's time somebody else goes." She objects, giggling.

"Come on, it's fine if you always go. You're the president of this club anyway, which means you're already very responsible. Besides, I heard the chosen charity for this year has something to do with kids, and I know how much you like to help them. You love children, Ally." The guy counters for he can see in his club leader's face how much she wants to go.

"You know what I think? I think you should go. Sarah, too." Ally says right as soon as the guy finishes speaking.

"Who else is in favor of sending Ally as one of the theatre people's representative? Please raise your hands."

As if on cue, all members of the club raise their hands. The guy smirks at Ally before shrugging.

"Any more objections, Miss Dawson?" He says.

"Fine," Ally sighs in defeat. There are more than 30 theatre members, and she's pretty sure one argument from her doesn't have any say against that much people. "If all of you are really that persistent, I'll go."

The members cheer briefly before returning their attention back to Ally, as they still need one more representative. She actually has her eyes set either on Sarah or that one boy who's always quiet and normally sits at the back of the room every time she holds a meeting for the club.

"Hmm, let's see…" Ally mumbles, tapping her finger on her chin in thought. "How about—"

"Me?"

Suddenly, Ally hears a male voice behind her back, volunteering himself as a representative. She's pretty sure every member is present as she already mentally did the club's attendance roll, so she's quite eager to turn around to see who was late for the meeting.

But the person she sees is someone she never really expects.

"Dallas?" Ally asks in surprise.

"I volunteer as a representative."

"You can't be one if you're not a member of this club." Ally informs, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I'm aware, but I already talked to the head administrator and she said that it is fine to join other clubs even though you're not part of it—well, she said it could only happen if you're really that desperate." Dallas explains.

"Don't you have your band—?"

"Music club." Dallas corrects instantaneously.

"Oh, so you're calling it a Music Club now, huh?"

Dallas shrugs in reply, not really sure with what to say next. Soon after though, he finally finds something to tell Ally. "Anyway, the four of us figured that since everyone wants to be a representative, and we're only allowed to take two, we asked if we could just split and join other clubs. And besides, the administrator said it doesn't have to be exactly two representatives, the maximum is three."

"I've never heard of that rule before. Are you just making that up, Dallas?" Ally asks dubiously.

Dallas shakes his head like a little boy, his hands behind him. "Nope, I'm definitely not. Besides, like what the administrator said, if you're really that desperate then it's fine to—"

"All right, you are now officially representing Theatre Club, Mr. Erwin." Ally formally says in one swift breath as she forcefully takes Dallas's hand in hers and shakes it quickly.

* * *

Meanwhile, from across the spot where Ally and Dallas are currently conversing, Austin watches the two's interaction and he can't shake off the need to keep observing. A few moments ago, Dallas decided that the group should split and find other clubs to represent. Austin is originally pining for Ally's club since it's the closest thing to music, but since Dallas got there first and it looks like he's in because of the handshake, he doesn't have any clue which club he's going to pipe into for the event.

Elliot walks up next to Austin and claps his shoulder, taking his blonde friend out of his trance.

"Ah, young love. Too adorable, eh?" Elliot comments, gazing at the same direction as Dallas and Ally. "Those two still have feelings for each other, don't you think?"

Austin averts his eyes away from the ex-couple standing across the room from him. He gives a quick glance at Elliot before proceeding to watch Dallas and Ally once again.

"Eh…don't really care if they still do." Austin replies half-heartedly, knowing to him that the greater part of what he said is untrue.

"Then why are you still staring?"

"I wasn't staring. What are you talking about?" Austin excuses.

"Sure you are. I've been watching for the past couple of minutes, Austin."

"I wasn't—" Austin stops, thinking that it's better to change the topic rather than argue more with Elliot. "Have you chosen a club yet?"

"I went with Carrie's."

"Which is?"

"She's in the student government." Elliot casually responds.

"Don't you have to _be_ a student officer to join?" Austin questions, his eyebrows furrowing.

Elliot shakes his head, disbelieving the fact that Austin is underestimating his capabilities. "I offered to be an assistant." He clarifies.

"You are unbelievable." Austin chuckles.

The two grow silent for a while, but not until Elliot taps Austin's shoulder again and says, "By the way, I kind of noticed a while ago how you were staring at Dallas and—"

"Elliot, no, not this again. And I believe I already told you I wasn't staring!"

"Dashing dude in denial," Elliot comments, and then suddenly remembers something: "Correct me if I'm wrong, but, I heard from Dez that apparently, Ally was in your apartment last Tuesday. Is Dez lying or is he not?"

"She was in my apartment, yes, and it was unintentional." Austin explains.

"Did she, by any chance, spend the night?"

"No, I wouldn't allow her to." Shaking his head, the tall blonde replies.

"So you're saying that she asked you if she could?"

"No! Geez, Elliot; you and your perverted mind."

Elliot raises his arms up in surrender. "I was just asking, Austin! I didn't ask if you two did the…you know." His voice trails off by the end of his sentence.

"Why in the world would you think that? I mean, come on! Have you seen me when Ally is around? Pretty sure she wants to kill me, and I'm very positive our intentions are mutual." Austin counters, sneaking a quick glance at Dallas and Ally, who are currently laughing at something Austin would never know of.

"I think otherwise." Elliot ventures before adjusting the strap of his bag on his shoulder and storming out of the main gym.

* * *

After the meeting is over and all club members start heading home, Carrie sees Ally and immediately runs toward her. She loops her arm around Ally's like she usually does every time it's just the two of them.

"So…who are this year's theatre's representatives?" Carrie questions excitedly, too excited actually that she's close to skipping her way to the parking lot.

"Me…and Dallas."

"_Dallas__? _Since when did he become a theatre kid?"

"Apparently, the band had issues about which members would go as representatives, so Dallas had this idea that they should split up and join the club of their choice." Ally explains briefly, not really feeling like indulging into details like she normally does when telling a story.

"Oh, so that is why Dallas couldn't keep away from you." Carrie coos, nudging Ally's arm in the process.

"What was he supposed to do then? Ask to be a representative and leave once he gets the position? Of course, he's gonna wanna stay and chat with the club."

"Apparently, it looked like he was all over you. Austin himself couldn't even keep his eyes away from you two."

"Austin?" Ally asks in bafflement. "How in the world did he get in this conversation? As far as I can remember, we're talking about Dallas here."

"Oh, so you don't know?"

"Obviously, I don't."

Carrie sighs before speaking, "Austin was supposed to join you because he thinks that theatre is the closest thing a club could get to music. I was watching you two, you know. And then Dez kind of held him up because he had some 'dilemma' with this one club that he wanted to represent, so Dallas unintentionally stole Austin's spot in your club. Oh, poor boy, he doesn't know what he's doing sometimes." She recounts, glancing down at her shoes.

"Carrie, if you're trying to mess with me right now, it's not working."

"Why won't you believe me?"

"Uh, because of the fact that Austin hates my guts? Why would he choose to represent my club? Doesn't he know that choosing my club means he gets to spend time with _my _representatives, which coincidentally happens to be _me_?"

"He could like you, you know?" Shrugging, Carrie ventures.

Ally literally laughs out loud. "Are you joking? He doesn't even consider me as his friend, let alone like me as more than that." She says, her laughter slowly dying off into giggles.

Carrie opens her mouth to counter Ally's statement, but is interrupted by Brooke who's yelling out Ally's name from the school's garden.

"I'll call you tonight, all right?" Ally tells Carrie. "See ya."

As soon as Carrie detaches her arm from being looped around Ally's, the latter girl heads off to talk to Brooke.

"Hey, I didn't see you last night. You told me you were coming home." Ally says upon arriving at her cousin's spot on the garden.

"What's the real score between you and Dallas?" Brooke asks right away, ignoring Ally's query.

"What?"

"I asked you what's going on between you and Dallas?" This time, Brooke makes sure that her voice has enough bitterness in it for Ally to get the hint.

"Brooke, if you're suspecting that Dallas and I are in a secret relationship or something, well, we're not. He's one of my best friends and we just happen to have the closest relationship amongst everyone in the group. Yes, I'm aware that we do act like a couple sometimes, but trust me, we're really not." Ally falsely states.

At that exact moment, Brooke never wanted anything more than to garrote Ally right on the spot. She may as well include Dallas as she went to his house last Tuesday to ask him about the shirt, but the boy said the exact same thing that Ally did. She's seen the picture, she's seen Dallas's shirt under her cousin's bed, she's seen the date of their anniversary, what more of an evidence could she possibly need? But because Brooke enjoys interrogating Ally even though she somewhat already knows the truth, she doesn't say anything about her recent findings.

But Brooke wants to make one thing clear to Ally before she dramatically sashays away.

"Look, Ally, let me make this clear to you: I like Dallas, okay? And I know that you feel the same way about him too. That night in the restaurant when you told me Dallas was in the mall as well, I saw how you two looked at each other all the time. Those little hand gestures, you thought I didn't see that, but I did. And I know it means something—"

"Brooke—"

"I kindly suggest you distance away from Dallas." Brooke grimly states.

"Are you serious?" Ally questions furiously.

"Do you think I'm joking?"

"It's impossible, what you're asking for! Dallas and I basically share the same group of friends, and we're going to be representing the Theatre Club for the Reach Out Program next week. I have to communicate with him no matter what!"

"You found a way to keep your relationship with Dallas a secret for almost two years—"

"How did you know that?"

"I don't see why you wouldn't be capable of finding a way to avoid him now."

* * *

**DUN. DUN. DUN. Brooke has finally let out her inner beast! And because it's now 11:47pm, my brain can't think of anything else to write. So, let me know what you think :) Also, sorry if there would be wrong names right there. I'm too tired to even go through the entire chapter once again.**


	8. Chapter 8

**It's not Saturday yet, but I'll update anyway. Decided to take a break from my business plan project and write this chapter up. I'm sorry if it's a bit all over the place because I didn't even edit it, I don't know why I didn't.**

**Anyway, it's really short but I hope you'll still enjoy it.**

* * *

**Chapter 8**

"Stop, stop, stop!" Austin commands as he raises an arm to stop his band from playing. "Elliot, can't you get the proper note? You're supposed to play G major, not E!"

Elliot raises his hands up, nodding. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm just…not feeling well today." He reasons, which is actually true.

"Austin, how about we take a break for ten minutes?" Dallas suggests, he as well is feeling exhausted from all the drumming he's been doing for the past hour and a half. "My arms need a little rest anyway."

Austin glances at his band mates individually and he can easily tell the exhaustion they are feeling from the look in their tired eyes. With a sigh, he removes the guitar strap off of his body before announcing that the band is officially taking a ten-minute break.

"I'll just fill up my water bottle. I'll be back in a second." Austin says before heading out of the band room, looking down at his tattered jeans, just barely realizing how dirty looking it really is. He closes the door and when he turns around, he unintentionally bumps into someone, a girl specifically.

Austin catches the girl by her shoulder, helping her regain her balance.

"You better watch where you're going next time, young lady." Austin comments, waiting for the girl to at least look up at him.

As if on cue, she raises her head up and Austin chuckles as a reaction after finally finding out who's the girl.

"Oh," Ally mutters. "Hi, Austin."

"Why are you still here? School's over like…an hour ago." Austin questions, uncapping and capping his empty water bottle.

"I'm doing a table read for the upcoming play." Ally replies, hooking her thumb to the direction of the auditorium. "What about you? What are you still doing here?"

"Band practice." Austin answers casually. "The head administrator asked the band to perform at the Reach Out Program."

"This is the first time I'm going to hear you guys play. I've seen you four walking around a few times with your instruments, but not actually hearing you play."

"Try not to fall in love once you hear us." Austin coltishly warns.

Ally punches Austin playfully. "As if." She teases, scoffing.

"I also heard that they have a very handsome front man."

"Keep dreaming, Moon."

Austin chuckles in reply before charmingly staring at Ally. He's actually planning to mess with the girl in front of him and possibly make her feel uneasy under his intense gaze; and fortunately, he's succeeding. Austin takes note of the way Ally is slowly squirming in her spot, and the way her eyes are darting everywhere but refuses to meet his.

Ally, on the other hand, desperately wants to break free from the awkward state she is currently in with Austin. After her attempts to avoid looking straight at Austin's eyes, she finally does.

"I really need to go to the bathroom, so…" she announces, not even bothering to wait for a response from the tall boy. "I'll catch up with you, later."

Austin nods before he, himself, reasons that he needs to be back in the band room so he has to fill up his water bottle fast. They walk the opposite directions, Austin constantly looking back at Ally. The closer he gets to the water fountain, the more he's in conflict with himself. He wants to tell Ally about what he has been thinking about for a while since they watched _Shrek _in his apartment.

"Oh, who am I kidding?" Austin mutters to himself before turning to his heels and jogging to catch up with Ally. It isn't a tough job actually, catching up with her; since he have long legs compared to the girl's short ones. His strides are bigger than hers, so it isn't long until Austin is walking alongside Ally.

When Ally notices the boy walking beside her, his water bottle still empty, her eyebrows scrunch together in thought. She gestures at his bottle.

"I thought you're gonna get that filled up?" Ally asks.

"The water fountain I was originally going for is father from the band room than the one by there." Austin answers, pointing at the water fountain in front of the bathrooms where Ally is heading.

Unbeknownst to Ally, the water fountain by the band room is actually closer since it's just around the corner. Austin just wants an excuse to walking next to her and talking to her. Much to Austin's relief, Ally buys his lie.

The two saunters alongside one another in utter silence before Ally speaks up, breaking the ice between them.

"You know, I never really got the chance to thank you." Ally ventures, gazing up at the tall boy beside her.

"Thank me for what?"

Ally shrugs before letting out a nervous giggle. "For always being there for me, I guess. You always drive me home when Dallas couldn't—" Austin flinches slightly "—you provided me with breakfast when I always forget to eat, and you tried to keep me away from the delinquents. And I thank you for that, Austin."

"Hey," he responds, nudging her elbow with his, "that's what friends are for, right? They look after each other?" Austin's aware of what he just said that is why he retains his eyes fixated on Ally, waiting for her to comprehend his statement.

"Yeah, that's what they—wait, did you just say _friends_?" Ally inquires, the corners of her mouth curving up into the most gleeful smile Austin has ever laid his eyes on.

He never realizes how important gaining his friendship is to Ally, and he's content that he made her that happy now that he finally granted the girl's only wish from him.

"I'm pretty sure I did."

"So, we are actually friends now?"

"Unless you don't want to." Austin frolicsomely replies.

"I do! I want to be your friend. Gosh, I sound so desperate."

The two finally reaches the bathroom area. Austin immediately heads to the water fountain to fill up his water bottle as Ally enters the ladies'. Not long after a minute, Austin notices from the corner of his eye the band room door opening, and out comes Dez running towards his direction.

"What's taking you so long?" Dez interrogates as soon as he reaches his band mate.

Austin takes a quick over the shoulder glance at the ladies' bathroom before turning to Dez and capping his water bottle close.

"The goddamn water fountain by the band room took so long to work…had to use it instead." Austin reasons, hearing the faucet being turned on inside the ladies' bathroom.

Satisfied with his friend's answer, Dez nods. "Come on, it's been twelve minutes. The rest of us are waiting for you so we could start." He informs.

Dez and Austin start to head back to the band room. Austin cannot help but to feel bad about something as small as leaving Ally, assuming that the girl is probably expecting to see him waiting for her to finish. But because of Dez complaining about how they would not be able to write a new song for the program due to the time shortage, Austin seems to be brushing off the guilt the closer they get to the band room.

A couple of minutes later, Ally comes out of the bathroom with a smile on her face, only for it to drop after seeing that Austin is not there anymore.

* * *

After Ally finishes her table read for the upcoming end-of-the-year play, she hears her phone blaring off her rather irritating ringtone from her backpack. She takes one strap off of her shoulder to fish out her phone, which could probably be found under her books by then.

Luckily, her hand instantly gets ahold of the device and when she checks who's calling her, Ally's eyebrows rise in surprise.

Brooke.

She presses the answer button before placing the speaker next to her ear.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Ally, I know you're probably mad at me for what I said the other day. It was too harsh, I guess—"

"No," Ally interrupts, shaking her head despite Brooke's inability to see her. "No, it's fine. I—"

"Great! Can I borrow your car then?"

"Wait, what?"

"My friends and I are heading to this party downtown and I stupidly forgot to put gas in my car this morning. Now, it's stuck in our school's parking lot and…wait, you're still in school right?"

"Yes."

"Awesome! I already took your keys from your bag and—"

"How did you—?"

"I'm actually driving your car right now. Don't you worry, my dear cousin, I'll bring him back to you with full tank...if that's what you're worrying about." Brooke assures, although her tone of voice has a slight hint of venom in it.

"I don't care if you bring it back empty or full tank, I just want my car so I could drive myself home." Ally responds solidly, anger starting to seep through her having caught the hints her cousin keeps on dropping at her.

"Too bad now, huh, Ally? I guess you'll just have to take a cab. Oh wait! Maybe _Dallas _could give you a ride home?"

"Brooke—"

"Ta-ta!"

"Brooke—"

The phone beeps, signaling Brooke dropping the call. Ally stares at the screen as her hand quickly clutches the device tightly in anger. She knows it's too good to be true, Brooke's sudden apology about her rude attitude towards her the other day. She knows she should have seen it coming, but apparently, she loves her cousin so much that Ally refuses to believe the harsh reality.

"Maybe Trish could pick me up." Ally mumbles to herself, unlocking her phone and quickly finding her friend's number.

As soon as it starts ringing, Ally hears a loud chatter behind her back. She turns around and she sees the boys of Austin's band with their sweaty selves and their instruments still slinging across their bodies (except for Dallas since he can't really sling the entire drum set on him).

Dallas catches her looking in their direction and waves at her, the same time Ally drops her call to Trish.

"Where's your car?" He asks.

"Brooke's car ran out of gas, so I lent her mine. She needs it more than me anyway." Ally answers even though she knows the last part is clearly false.

"Come on, I'll take you home then." Dallas offers.

"Oh, no, it's fine. I'll just call a cab." Ally refuses having remembered Brooke's request regarding Dallas.

"Aw, Ally, you know I've been driving you home since your freshman year. Just because you're finally capable of driving yourself and you have your own car, doesn't mean I can't drive you home once in a while."

"I'll take her home." Very out of the blue, Austin offers surprising not only himself, but the rest of his band as well, including Ally. "Her apartment is like three apartments away from mine anyway."

"That's very nice of you, Austin, but I think it's my turn now." Dallas comments, his gaze becoming stern which each passing second.

"I'm trying to save you up some gas, Dallas."

"I don't care about the gas."

"What's the point of having to drive her home, and then drive back to the other side of the town? That's a huge waste of gas consumption in my opinion." Austin argues.

Dallas grows silent for a while, his eyes darting from Ally to Austin, back to Ally, and then back to Austin again.

Dez and Elliot remain standing in the back, eagerly waiting for what is about to happen next. The two of them are aware of the growing tension between their two friends ever since Dallas became busy with the senior stuff, and Austin is constantly the only one there for Ally.

After being silent for a while, Dallas nods at Austin reluctantly.

"Make sure she's safely inside her house before you drive away." He instructs strictly, having it being one of his normal habits as a boyfriend.

"I will." Austin agrees before urging Ally to come with him to his car.

When they are finally at a decent distance away from the group, Ally turns to Austin and interrogates him about what happened back in the lobby with Dallas.

"Didn't I just say it back there, Ally? What's the point of driving to the other end of town and then driving back to the other end? It's a complete waste." Austin answers, not really feeling like talking about what previously happened or just Dallas in general.

"Hey, it's not my fault Dallas and I live on the ends of the town."

"And it's also not my fault why Dallas is so willing to trash his gas." Austin retorts.

"You two didn't have to make such a fuss about it though. I was just about to call Trish to come and get me." Ally says.

"Can we just not talk about this, Ally? I want to be in a good mood."

"In a good mood for what?" Ally asks as they finally reach Austin's car.

Austin unlocks the car and opens the passenger door for Ally. He grins at her and says, "Hop in, I want to show you something."

* * *

Austin has been very secretive the entire car ride. He'll usually take alternative routes every single time Ally recognizes the place they're in. Once they are finally at their destination, Ally glances at Austin disbelievingly.

"The aquarium? Really?"

"Why? What's wrong with it? It's a nice place." Austin says, ducking his head to take a look at the aquarium, which is already closed at that time of night.

It's almost 9:30 in the evening (they left school at seven, and since they live far away from the city, it was almost a two-hour drive to get to the aquarium), and the place usually closes at nine because of the employees doing some last-minute cleanup on the animal tanks and making sure the animals are already sleeping.

"Are you out of your mind? We're not allowed to be here! If we get caught, we're going straight to jail." Ally says through gritted teeth.

"We're only gonna end up in jail if we get ourselves caught." Austin counters before urging Ally to unload his car. But due to his excitement, he impatiently circles his car and literally pulls her out. He slams the door close and locks his vehicle.

"Where are we going?" Ally questions as Austin drags her towards the back of the building.

"We're going to see the penguins." He answers candidly. "I came here one night and I discovered this little area at the back of the building showing the exact cage where the penguins are kept. It's like a small window, but it gives you an excellent view."

When they get there, Austin squats and takes a peek at the small accidental peephole and smiles to himself when he sees that the penguins are still awake. He gestures for Ally to come before leaning away so she can take a look.

Ally peeks through the hole and she immediately giggles when she sees a penguin trying to climb on the rock platform.

"Oh, my gosh, Austin!" She exclaims in a whispering manner.

"What? What are they doing?"

"They're so adorable! You gotta see that one penguin at the far right corner." Ally orders as she leans away this time to allow Austin to see that specific penguin.

Austin hastily peeks and a genuine laugh escapes his mouth when he watches the same penguin struggling to get up to the rock platform. "Come on, little buddy, you can do it." He mumbles.

Ally watches him adore the little penguins and she can't help but to flash a smile. It's pretty easy to tell that Austin loves penguins very much, and she assumes that he would be that type of guy that only takes his date to the aquarium so he could see that one particular animal. If she knows, Austin is probably going to stay at the penguin section the entire time, just watching the animal swim around its cage.

Starting to feel uncomfortable with the silence blanketing the two of them, Austin leans away from the peephole, gazing at Ally's eyes sincerely.

"I know it's a very inconvenient time to ask this, but, you mentioned once that you never really wanted to be that popular. Would you care to elaborate?" Austin asks, but then suddenly remembers that it's a sensitive topic for Ally so he adds, "I'm sorry. You don't have to answer that if you don't want to."

Ally shakes her head in disagreement. "No, no, it's fine. It's actually nice to know that someone wants to talk to me about it. I've never really opened up about this kind of stuff to Trish or Carrie, not even with Dallas, who is my closest friend in your band." She replies.

"So…?"

Sighing, Ally looks straight at the peephole, only catching small glimpses of the swimming penguins. "It's fine, I admit, but you don't know the pressure they put on you—social wise and academic wise. Everyone expects the best from you, and honestly, I can't give out my best all the time. And when you don't give your all, they'll pressure you into becoming better. It's not like that's a bad thing—because it's not—but it's getting exhausting, Austin. I'm getting tired." She explains heavily, suddenly feeling like all the weight is put back on her shoulders.

Austin remains frozen and speechless. He doesn't know that that is what Ally is feeling like about her popularity in school. Everyone expects the best from her, and when she fails to provide that, they will give her a harder time in return. He can't imagine himself being in Ally's position. It seems like there's a lot to take in.

He's aware that a hug is the most suitable thing to do at the moment, but since he's Austin Moon, he resorts into giving Ally's shoulder an awkward pat instead.

Ally, however, doesn't know what to say or what to do next, so she turns to the small peephole again and notices that the penguin finally made it up on the rock platform.

"He made it! Austin, he made it!" Ally excitingly announces as she leans away from the tiny hole to allow Austin to see the penguin they'd been eyeing for a while.

When Austin sees that the penguin really did made it, he cheers alongside Ally as well.

"I knew he'd make it." He tells Ally with a legitimate smile plastered don his face.

Suddenly, Austin notices a flashlight being shone on the other side of the building, and he knows for a fact that it's the night guard. He's seen him a few times before and he always patrols around the building, making sure the perimeter is clear and safe. Ally has her back on the said officer; so Austin quietly instructs her to keep her mouth shut, and whatever happens, do _not _say his name at all.

"In the count of three, I want you to start running to my car. I'll be right behind you." Austin whispers.

"Austin, what is happening?"

"One."

"Austin—"

"What did I say about not saying my name?" He mutters under his breath. "Two."

"You're starting to freak me out."

"Three. Go!"

The same time Ally gets up to her feet and starts running, the night guard rounds the corner and accidentally shines his flashlight on the two sprinting teenagers. He blows his whistle and calls them both out.

"You told me we're not gonna get caught!" Ally exclaims, her breath becoming jagged due to her running.

"I didn't guarantee that we're not! I only said we're not gonna go to jail if we don't get ourselves caught!"

"Apparently, we are on our way there now!"

"Just get in the car!" Austin desperately instructs.

"It's still locked, Austin!"

"Shoot!" The boy scrambles to unlock his car. Despite his shaken state, though, he manages to unlock it and they both hurriedly load inside. Austin starts the engine up immediately and drives away.

Ally looks back and hears the aquarium's guard screaming, "Stupid teenagers!"

When they finally drove away from the aquarium and Austin already entered the freeway, Ally gives up looking behind them every minute to see if there's already a bunch of police cars after them in the case that they have been reported by the night guard. She sighs in relief and hits Austin angrily in his arm, which causes for the boy to laugh in disbelief.

"What?" Austin asks, laughing.

"You gave me a heart attack! I thought we're gonna get sent to jail!"

"But we didn't, so it's fine, Ally." Austin assures.

"Don't you ever do that to me again, Austin Monica!"

"Aw, come on; admit it, it was fun."

"It _was _until that stupid guard got involved."

"Come on, the running away from guard was the most fun part."

Ally crosses her arms over her chest and gazes out her window. Thinking about it, it really _was _fun. It gave her the thrill that she hasn't felt for a long time. It gave her a sense of badass-ness somehow, and she enjoyed it very much. As a result, she snickers and Austin quickly turns his head to look at her.

"It was fun, wasn't it?" He asks, amused at Ally's sudden change of vibe.

"Fine, it was. I enjoyed it tons."

"Do you now see that I am capable of loosening up?" Austin asks, this time his voice has become a tad serious.

"Did you do that just so you could prove a point?"

Austin shrugs. "If you want to think of it that way." He points out.

"I always knew you're a cool guy, Austin. It's just that you're so caught up with hating me so much that you're not actually sending off the good vibes." Ally ventures, averting her eyes away from Austin. She can feel the tip of her ears heating up, the cause of her saying what comes to the top of her head and not giving it any kind of consideration or whatsoever before speaking it out loud.

As a response, Austin gives a brief sideway glance at Ally before returning his attention back on the road.

And the rest of the car ride is silent.

* * *

Austin drops Ally off at her apartment (Brooke waiting for her at the front door despite her current feelings for her cousin. Even though she's mad that Ally is lying to her about Dallas, she still feels that she has to be there for Ally to stand as her older sister). And just like Dallas told him to do, Austin does wait for Ally to safely get inside her house before he drives away.

He drives to his apartment, and when he gets in, he can hear the sound of the television from where he stands. Austin makes his way to the living room and sees Dez lazily sitting on the long couch, the remote loosely hanging off his hand.

"Dez, why are you still up?" Austin questions.

"Couldn't sleep, that's all."

"All right," Austin says. "I'll be heading to bed now. Goodnight, mate."

Hearing Dez saying goodnight back, Austin trudges up the stairs and into his room. Upon closing his door, his entire body falls freely on the bed, Austin not even caring if he's not in his sleeping clothes. He adjusts his position on the bed before pulling his blanket up to his chin.

It's been a very eventful day so he's pretty knackered. The weird thing about it though, Austin thinks, is that he can actually feel how tired he is, and yet, he just can't fall asleep. Somehow, he feels like something's keeping him up. Perhaps it's not a 'something' but a certain _someone_. He tosses and he turns, removing his blanket off of his body and then putting it back; he flips his pillow so the colder side is facing up, and still, he cannot sleep.

Finally accepting the fact that he's not going to get any sleep sooner, Austin sits up and turns his lampshade on. He reaches to his side to open the drawer of his bedside table to pull out a notebook and a pencil. After opening up the notebook on the first available blank page he sees, Austin starts to write the lyrics that has been keeping him up after all this time.

And just like that, the rest of the song comes naturally to Austin.

* * *

**Is this story really going so slow? I just feel like I should detail the progress of A&A's relationship, because no one hates a person that much and then suddenly wakes up the next day, and be like, "Hey, I like you. Let's be together!"**

**But anyway, let me know what you think :)**


	9. Chapter 9

**It's Saturday and that means it's update day! I'm thinking of answering a few reviews before we move on to the story.**

**#1: To be honest, I don't exactly know when I'm going to decide what chapter I want for Austin to confess to Ally the real reason why he was so cold. But I may drop a few hints here and there once in a while.**

**#2: ROMANCE is coming soon! Actually, it's already brewing *wiggles my eyebrows***

**#3: I actually considered putting titles on my chapters, but obviously I never got around to doing it.**

**#4: The name of Austin's band will be revealed soon! I already chose a band name from your suggestions! I'M EXCITED TO ANNOUNCE IT!**

**Well, I think that's it...enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 9**

The following week, Austin's band has been very heavy on practice since the Reach Out Program is already happening on Saturday next week. During one of their breaks, Dez notices Austin sitting in the corner of Elliot's garage strumming his guitar to an unfamiliar tune. He watches as Austin smoothly glides his guitar pick across the strings a few more times before writing the notes he came up with on the notebook sitting next to him.

Dez walks up to Austin to see what he's doing even though he already has an idea.

"This song is dedicated to a very—"

"Hey! You're not allowed to look at this!" Austin snaps, taking the notebook from the spot next to him in an attempt to hide it from Dez.

Dez raises his arms up in surrender. "I'm sorry, I wasn't aware." He informs innocently.

"What do you want, Dez? I'm quite busy right now."

"So…whom are you dedicating the song to?" Being the usual nosy guy that he is, Dez takes a seat next to Austin on the beat-up couch in Elliot's garage and goes on to pursue his mission regarding Austin's new song.

"I'm not telling you." Austin answers, twirling the pencil in his hand so the eraser side is facing the paper.

"Why not?"

"I'm not even sure if I really want to dedicate this song to her anyway. This is probably a bad idea…I shouldn't have wrote this lame song."

"Why?" Dez presses. He knows how much Austin dislikes getting asked a bunch of questions, but it's a really good day to bombard him considering that he's writing a special song to a mystery girl that he's yet to find out whom.

"I don't know…I'm so confused right now. I'm not really sure about how I feel for her." Austin answers candidly.

"Can I hear the song?" Dez requests.

Shaking his head, Austin replies, "It's not even good so don't bother."

"Can I _at least _read the lyrics?"

Sighing, Austin hands Dez his notebook. He watches as Dez carefully scans every line of the song, and as he finishes, Dez has a big smile on his face and his head is nodding in approval.

"What's bad about it, Austin? This song is actually really good. I like it very much. And you made it very upbeat." Dez comments. "You should let the band hear it. If they like it, we can play that on the Reach Out Program instead."

"I'm not sure, Dez." Austin ventures.

"Why? Are you afraid she might hear it?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Come on, Austin; do you honestly think I still have no clue as to which girl you're talking about in the song? It's kind of obvious it's about Ally." Dez blurts out.

Austin bites his lip and averts his eyes away from his friend, embarrassed. "Did I really make it that obvious? Should I change a few lines to make it more subtle?" He slightly panics, his hand about to erase a few words he recently wrote.

"No, no, don't change anything." Dez responds, taking the pencil away from Austin. "But regarding you being too obvious…hate to break it to you, mate, but it seems like you're starting to like Ally. I've always had a hunch that one of you would fall for the other."

"And I am so not gonna be the one falling. For all we know, it's her." Austin counters, plucking a few strings in his guitar and avoiding Dez's gaze entirely.

Dez chuckles. "Yeah, you may want to rethink that." He advises.

"I don't think I have to—"

"Do you know what I think you should do?" Dez cuts Austin's sentence short.

"What?"

"Show that song to us and we'll learn it as fast as we can. If we're successful, we're going to sing that song next Saturday, and we'll make sure that Ally _knows _the song is directed to her."

* * *

Dez stands in the corner of the garage as his band mates are currently packing up to leave. Often times he will briefly turn around to check if one of them decides to sneak up on him and surprise him.

"All right, I'll see you later." Dez says to his caller before he hangs up his phone. He places the device back in his pocket while turning around to face his band mates. He's quite startled though to see Austin already standing behind him, his instrument already packed up.

"Whom were you talking to?" Austin questions innocently.

"It was Trish." Dez lies, as he doesn't really want to screw up the plan he just came up with after speaking to Austin about Ally's song a while ago.

"Oh." Austin replies. "Is everything all right?"

Dez nods instantly. "Yeah, yeah, everything's cool." He responds.

By then, Elliot and Dallas are already standing next to them, both ready to call it a day since they have been in Elliot's garage practicing intensely since nine in the morning.

"Hey, uh, I'm really sorry but something came up with my family and I really need to be there. Can we hang out some other time instead?" Dallas asks, his finger constantly rubbing his nose.

The others may be fooled with it, but Austin knows deep inside that Dallas is only finding a "legitimate" excuse to avoid Austin. Ever since the night he took Ally to see the penguins, Dallas has grown cold towards him. Often times, the boy would purposely mess up his drum rhythm—slowing it down or speeding it up—just so Austin won't be able to keep up, and the rest of the band will point their fingers at him for ruining their already-perfected synchronization.

"Yeah, me too," Elliot points out, "but it's not a family thing…it's…I already promised Carrie I'd take her out to dinner tonight."

Dez and Austin nod in approval.

"Got some boyfriend duties to tend to now." Elliot says, which earns a laugh from each of his band mates.

"It's fine…it's not like this is the last time we're going to be hanging out together as a band, right? We've got plenty of time…especially in the summer!" Dez says sounding a little too excited than he intends to. Who can blame him? His plan is working too well! He doesn't have to feel bad anymore about ditching Elliot and Dallas just so he can take Austin to the diner to act out his plan.

Soon after, Elliot enters his house to get ready for his dinner with Carrie as Dallas heads off to his own. The moment the two are completely out of sight, Dez passes an arm around Austin's shoulder, leading him out of Elliot's garage and into his car.

"To Betsy's Diner we go!" Dez exclaims.

"Betsy's Diner? I thought we're going to that burger place in town?"

Dez scrunches his nose. "Nah, Betsy's burgers are better." He excuses, starting up his engine.

"But I thought you loathe it? Your exact words, not mine."

"People change, Austin, and so do their taste buds."

* * *

When Austin and Dez finally arrive at Betsy's Diner, they immediately claim the corner table on the left side. Austin takes the menu that is set on the table in front of him before looking at Dez, who he can easily tell is pretending to scan the dessert booklet. He knows how much his friend hates the diner, so why decide to eat there rather than in that burger place in town?

Having enough of being the clueless one, Austin puts his menu down and sighs. "Dez, what are we really doing here? You hate this place." He asks.

Exhaling loudly, Dez caves in.

"Fine, I brought you here so that no one from our school would see us with this…" He confesses pulling his flannel shirt up a little to reveal a Bubblegum Pop magazine tucked in his jeans.

"Dez, why in the world would we read that?" Austin asks incredulously. "Wait, here's a better question: why do you have that in the first place? That magazine is intended for twelve-year-olds! And I am not a twelve-year-old!"

Dez gently slams the magazine on the table, raising his hands up.

"Take a chill pill, man. I found that in my sister's old stuff in our garage this morning and I thought we'd make fun of it during band practice, but of course that didn't happen." Dez explains.

"Then why are we still going to read it?" Austin questions in confusion.

"I saw a quiz that would be perfect for you to take." Dez replies casually, occasionally glancing outside the diner as if he's waiting for someone. "Now…where is she?" He mutters under his breath, not really planning on Austin hearing him.

Unfortunately, he does.

"What?" Austin asks.

All of a sudden, the door opens and a bell chimes signaling there's a new customer. Austin looks at the door and is surprised to see Ally. Out of all the people in the world, it has to be her who came in; and out of all the diners in Miami, she chooses this one.

Dez pretends he's as surprised with her arrival as Austin is.

"Oh, wow! What a coincidence?" Dez tells Austin before turning around in his chair to grab his newly arrived friend's attention. "Ally! Over here!"

The girl turns her head at the sound of Dez's voice calling her name. She eyes both Austin and Dez and instantly waves at the two of them. She trudges toward their table, but remains standing by it rather than sitting down.

"So," Ally starts, looking at Dez, "why did you ask me to come here?"

"Uh…" Dez stalls, alternately looking between Austin and Ally.

"Wait," Austin interrupts, "so you didn't come here because you want to, but because Dez asked you to?"

"Pretty much, yeah." Ally answers.

Austin's gaze falls on Dez and eyes him questioningly.

Meanwhile, Dez's bouncing his leg up and down and scratching the back of his neck in agitation. He never really intends for Ally to see him in the diner, he's supposed to leave before she actually comes.

As if to save him from the ever-growing tension between the three of them, Dez's phone rings.

"Excuse me." He says, looking down at his phone and seeing it's a call from Trish, the one who is suppose to pick him up five minutes ago even before Ally arrived.

Austin keeps his eyes on Dez, but gets distracted when Ally takes Dez's seat in the diner table.

* * *

Seeing that he doesn't have Austin's attention anymore, Dez makes a quick turn to a street and immediately sees Trish waiting for him outside her car. Dez decides that since Betsy's is really not the tastiest diner in Miami, Austin and Ally may want to drive to another place, and it's just right for him to leave his car and keys on purpose and allow his friends to use it at least just for the day.

"Are you sure this is a great idea, Dez?" Trish asks once Dez is already loading her car.

"Yes, it is. I'm not supposed to tell you this, but I saw Austin writing a song about Ally during band practice this morning, and I have a feeling he's probably in denial with everything that has something to do with Ally. An afternoon spent together is something the two of them needs. Besides, isn't this what you want too…for Austin and Ally to finally get on each other's good sides?" Dez explains, glancing to his left to face Trish.

"I guess so." Trish replies, shrugging one shoulder.

"Having said that…want to go get some ice cream?"

* * *

It has been a while since Dez left the dinner, and yet neither Austin nor Ally has bothered to pick up the menu and actually order something to eat. They had already politely shooed away three waitresses in total.

"He's not coming back, isn't he?" Ally queries, gazing outside the window once again in hopes that their dear friend Dez did not really abandon them, as Austin had theorized earlier.

"Ally, it's been thirty minutes! Of course, he's not coming back." Austin answers. "Gosh, I should've known this was a set up!"

"Hey, Austin, calm down. We are in a diner ten minutes from our apartments. It's not like Dez left us alone in the middle of nowhere." Ally assures, glancing down at the table and noticing the Bubblegum Pop magazine that Dez brought earlier. "Besides, we got something to keep us entertained." She adds, raising the said magazine up and waving it in front of Austin's face.

"That's Dez's, not mine…just keep that in mind." Austin informs.

"I will." Ally replies, noticing that someone made a dog-eared bookmark on one of the pages. She opens it up on the page and a smile immediately spreads across her face. "I take it Dez's about to quiz you on something."

"Yeah, he mentioned something along those lines earlier before you came in."

"Confused about how you truly feel for her? Not sure if it's just a silly crush or more than that? Take this amazing quiz to find out!" Ally reads, letting out a guffaw soon afterwards. It's a good thing there's barely any people in the diner.

Austin's eyes widen in surprise. "Wait, what?" He reaches across the table to snatch the magazine out of Ally's grasp. He scans the quiz Dez was supposed to ask him to take. "Dez, I'm so going to kill you." Austin mumbles.

"So…Mr. Moon has a crush?" Ally teases, wiggling her eyebrows up and down.

Austin only shrugs.

"You don't know if you like someone? No wonder Dez's relying on a tween magazine for help." Ally comments, retrieving the magazine back from Austin. "All right, if you really want to find out, I'll quiz you."

"No, Ally."

"Please? All you have to do is answer as honestly as you can. That's all, I promise."

Suddenly, the door opens and a group of teenage boys around the same age as Austin and Ally enters the diner. They claim the table close to Austin and Ally's, giving Austin a full view of them.

"Okay, question one." Ally starts.

"Ally—"

"If she was depressed—wow, so much for a first question—what would you do?" Ally asks before listing all the options: "Do you…a) Care, but not that much, b) Truly care, c) Act like you care, while really you are checking her out, d) Care a lot, but don't act like it, or e) Kind of care…?"

"I'm not taking this stupid quiz that's meant for twelve-year-olds." Austin deadpans, his expression already suggesting boredom.

"Come on, Austin, just this one time. I promise, after this, you wouldn't be quizzed on something like this ever again. We can even burn this magazine together if you want." Ally protests.

Sighing, Austin answers reluctantly, "D."

"Question two," Ally announces. "If another guy is checking her out, you would…a) Turn around and check out the hot gal in the corner of the room, b) Turn a blind eye, c) Rip his balls off—oh dear, this is very brutal—d) Go start a convoy to distract her, or e) Get jealous?"

Ally looks up at Austin, awaiting his response, but she instantaneously takes note of the way Austin is looking at something from behind her. She curiously turns around and that's when she sees the group of teenage boys looking their way; and there is a boy who is apparently attempting to flirt with her through eye contact. He even sends her a wink, and it completely disgusts Ally.

"Come on, we're going somewhere else." Austin announces, standing up from his chair and grabbing Ally by her hand as if to show off to the group of boys.

"But how? We don't have a car. Trish just dropped me off."

"Dez forgot his car keys…and we're taking advantage of it." Austin answers quickly.

As they are heading out of the diner, Ally looks at the magazine one more time to browse over the options.

"After what happened inside the diner, I take it your answer is E."

* * *

After leaving, Austin drove Dez's car to a park twenty minutes from the secluded diner. It's a very hot day so Ally has never been so happy in her entire life when Austin asked her if she wants some ice cream.

"Thank you very much." Ally beams at the ice cream vendor after handing her two scoops of strawberry ice cream in a cone.

"So, what's next?" Austin questions, gesturing at the magazine tucked under Ally's arm.

"I thought you didn't want to take this quiz and you're just being forced to take it because of me?" Ally questions back taking a lick of her ice cream that is already starting to drip on the sides.

Austin shrugs, he as well takes a lick of his ice cream.

"It's better than not having anything to talk about, right?"

Ally agrees, claiming the magazine from under her arm.

"Okay, question three: If she went away forever, you would…a) Grieve, b) Grieve, but hope she is happy, c) Find a new chick, d) Kill her parents, or e) Call her periodically?" Ally quizzes, glancing to her right to look at Austin.

"I'd say E. You know, constantly checking on her…see how she's holding up with stuff." Austin answers.

"Fair enough." Ally comments. "Question four: If she came up to you and asked you if you would tell your best friend that she likes him, you would…a) Give the message grudgingly, b) Give the message, after all, you want her to be happy, c) Tell her no, or d) Kill your best friend?"

"Well, I can't actually kill Dallas." Austin mumbles under his breath. He finds it so ridiculously funny that the questions in the quiz are ironically matching up with his current situation with Dallas and Ally.

"Excuse me, what did you say?" Ally asks.

"I said B."

"Oh, I thought you said something else."

"No, I just mumbled my answer the first time." Austin counters.

"Well…question five—Whoa! This quiz asks such awful questions sometimes—okay, it's asking what you would do if she died? A) Remember her, but go find another girl to like right away, b) Grieve for eternity, c) Remember her, but don't waste life on grieving, or d) Kill yourself?"

"I would probably kill myself à la Romeo and Juliet." Austin teases, wiggling his eyebrows at Ally.

"Seriously?"

"No!" Austin laughs. "I was just kidding. I would go for the remember her, but don't grieve for life."

"Letter C it is."

* * *

Austin and Ally unanimously decide to pause the quiz for a while (Austin of course reasons that he's starting to second guess his decision to continue taking it). Currently, the two of them are standing in the middle of a bridge and gazing down at the ducks swimming around the pond.

"Austin, feed the ducks!" Ally commands excitingly, handing the boy the bag of torn up bread that Austin purchased earlier (it was when Ally first saw the ducks and decided to pressure Austin into buying a sack of something to eat).

"Why won't you do it yourself?" Austin asks.

"Because we're still not done with the quiz yet."

Austin groans. "How many questions are there?" He asks.

"Fifteen."

"And what number are we on now?"

"Six."

"Can we just skip this whole quiz thing?" Austin requests. "I don't even remember the reason why we even bothered to take this—or why Dez decided to do this in the first place."

"You said taking it is better than walking around the park and having nothing to talk about. Besides, Dez's supposed to quiz you anyway, right? If I hadn't come." Ally recounts, still trying to get Austin to take the sack of bread from her.

"Fine. I'll feed the ducks for you, and you keep asking. Let's get this stupid quiz over with." Austin says finally taking the sack from Ally's hand, accidentally brushing a couple of his fingers against hers.

"If you were alone in a room with her, you would…a) Make a move with her, b) Ignore her, or c) Talk to her?" Ally questions.

"Well…uh…I guess I would just go with A because if you are alone with someone in a room, you would end up talking anyway and talking usually leads to something—platonic, romantic, or nothing at all." Austin answers as he throws a handful of breadcrumbs in the pond.

"If her friends told her that you like her, you would…a) Not care, b) Be even nicer to her, or c) Ignore her?"

Austin stops throwing crumbs of bread at the ducks in the pond and turns to look at Ally straight in the eyes.

"I wouldn't care…besides, it's not like it's not already obvious." He answers.

Ally's lips part a little, her eyes still on Austin's. She doesn't exactly know why Austin is looking at her like that, or the meaning behind his answer's justification. All that she knows is that Austin's face is slowly getting closer to hers. She knows what's going on, so before anything else happens, she clears her throat and raises the magazine up so it's blocking Austin's face, preventing it from coming any closer.

"Uh…I was just grabbing my ice cream." Austin clarifies, leaning over to take his cup of ice cream that is apparently resting on the railing behind Ally.

"Oh, of course. Of course you are just getting your ice cream and not…something else." Ally's voice trails in the end, embarrassed with the fact that she even thought about Austin attempting to do _it_.

Austin turns back to the ducks while he shoves his hand inside the brown sack. He throws another handful of breadcrumbs at the pond before urging the suddenly-silent-and-embarrassed Ally to ask the next question on the quiz.

"If she asks you out," Ally questions, her voice a little shaky, "what would you say? A) 'Okay, let me ask my parents,' b) 'Okay…' c) 'NO!' d) 'I guess so…' or e) 'SURE!'?"

"Well—uh, I—I think—pass." Austin answers.

"But you can't. It's the last question and also the last thing that would determine your result. Just answer it." Ally explains, still feeling a bit uncomfortable from the recent happenings that occurred between her and Austin.

"How about you? What would you say if I ask you out?" Austin asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Isn't it obvious already, Austin Monica? Of course, I would say C." Ally jokes in hopes that it will somehow lighten the mood between them.

Austin cannot hide the disappointment in his features, even though it's possible that Ally's just being playful. But for some reason, he's hoping that somehow Ally will get the hint, but she's so naïve that she didn't even take his question so seriously…or at least that is how she made it seem like. Since he doesn't really want her worrying about why his mood suddenly changed, he lifts the sack of bread up, scoops a handful and carelessly throws it all at Ally's face.

"Austin!" Ally gasps her mouth remains agape afterwards. "Those are for the ducks!"

Austin lifts his shoulders up as he slowly backs away from the girl.

"You're not gonna get away with this!" Ally exclaims, her almost done ice cream in hand ready to attack his tall friend with it.

"Come and get me!" It's all that Austin says before turning around and starts to full-on sprint away.

Just like Austin, Ally starts to sprint as well in order to catch up with her running friend. Despite the awkward aura that blanketed the two of them earlier, Ally concludes that it's better to just shrug it off and put it behind them. She doesn't want it to be the only thing jeopardizing the newly acclaimed friendship she has with Austin.

* * *

**I'm quite disappointed with this one. This chapter is not my best but...I did foreshadowed a few things throughout this entire chapter. Let me see if you guys could get it right. Of course, I won't be telling you if you got it right (duh!), but let me know your guesses in your review!**

**Thanks! :)**


	10. Chapter 10

**Sorry I wasn't able to update yesterday. And I won't ever abandon this story, I'm having way too much fun with it. But anyway, I'm in a hurry right now because I'm going to be visiting the college I want to go to for next year, so without further ado, here's the tenth chapter! Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 10**

On Saturday, the chosen representatives all meet up at the school lobby for attendance before riding a rented bus to take them to the venue. It's an hour commute, in which the representatives don't mind. Dez, not surprisingly, takes the commute as his opportunity to sit next to Austin and interrogate him about what happened last weekend after he left him alone with Ally at Betsy's Diner.

"Well…" Austin sighs. "It was okay, I guess. Ally was rooting for you to come back but you never did. To be honest, I've always had a hunch that I was being set up. I mean come on, you and Betsy's burgers? I wouldn't even dream of it, mate."

Dez scoffs. "Damn right."

"In some way, though, I can't find a reason to be mad at you for leaving me alone with Ally. I'm never going to admit it to her face, but I actually enjoyed her company." Austin confesses, lowering his voice as for Ally to not hear him.

Dez smiles at Austin and places a hand on his shoulder. "You both need it anyway, trust me." He informs before putting on his headphones, making it clear to Austin that he doesn't need some explaining to do.

Dez knows Austin will get it…not eventually, but he will soon.

* * *

After arriving at the venue, the representatives quickly unload the bus to prepare their set-up for the opening program, especially the boys of Austin's band since they have a lot of plugging and wiring to do. It takes the entire crew 30 minutes to get the whole set-up done and ready to start. The children and all the elderly are all gathered up in the event center, eagerly waiting for the presentation the students of Marino High has in store for them.

The head coordinator comes up to the stage first to give the opening remarks. She goes on about the background of the Reach Out Program as the screen behind her flashes pictures taken from previous programs. After about ten minutes, she finally takes a brief break before introducing the first performer for the day.

"Thank you and I hope you will enjoy the performance that these four boys worked hard for. Trust me, they spent hours and hours in the band room just to make their performance really special for all of you. So please, give it up for _D.E.A.D!_"

The audience applauds as the entire band enters the stage.

Austin taps the microphone to check if it's working before smiling widely at his crowd and positioning his fingers on the guitar for the first note of the song. But then Dez, after sensing that Austin won't even vocally hint that the song is about a girl who is currently in the same room as them, taps his own microphone.

He clears his throat. "Hi, we are D.E.A.D, and we're going to be singing an original song that my mate here, Austin Moon, wrote himself. It's dedicated to a girl that is special to him. She's closer than you think she is." Dez announces, immediately spotting Ally in the crowd.

Austin briskly twists around and glares at Dez. He later gestures that Dez's going to get a word from him after.

"Yeah, setting aside what Dez said," Austin speaks with a nervous giggle, his eyes wandering around the room looking for Ally. He spots her in the very back of the event center. "This song is called _Voodoo Doll_."

On the count of three, Dallas starts drumming and the three guitarists immediately join in.

Instantly, the crowd cheers for them and the representatives standing at the back find themselves moving to the beat of the song. Even Ally, which obviously makes Austin smile, almost making him miss his cue to start singing.

_I don't even like you_

_Why you'd want to go and make me feel this way?_

_I don't understand what's happened_

_I keep saying things I never say_

Austin continues to sing, keeping his eyes set on Ally the entire time. He watches her as she dances to the beat of the song for the first part, but as he goes through the chorus and to the second verse, he notices that she's starting to get the hint that he's never going to tear his eyes away from her.

Meanwhile, Ally tries to shrug off the fact that Austin is staring at her ever since the performance started. She keeps in mind that Austin has a thing for Brooke, and what happened last week at the park meant nothing.

_I can feel you watching even when you're nowhere to be seen_

_I can feel you touching even when you're far away from me_

_Every time I see you, suddenly my heart begins to race_

_Every time I leave, I don't know why my heart begins to break_

Even though Austin's intense gaze on her is pretty much making her uneasy, Ally decides to just pretend she doesn't notice, as she doesn't really want to become a distraction for Austin. She doesn't want him to think that she's not enjoying his band. Besides, it's her first time hearing his band play and she wants to make her support very evident. They all have talents, and their sound is great as well, Ally thinks.

After another chorus, the boys finally finished their performance. The head coordinator congratulates them before moving on to another bullet point in her program.

As the rest of his band immediately head backstage, Austin shoves his way through the crowd in search of Ally. He sees Carrie, but Ally is no longer there anymore.

"Hey, where's Ally? I saw her with you a while ago." Austin inquires, panting.

"Oh, you just missed her. She said she's heading backstage to see you guys." Carrie replies, pointing at the direction where Ally headed.

"Thanks." Austin says.

He hurries to catch up to her, his confidence still on full-swing due to his energetic performance. When he gets backstage, Austin sees Ally with Dallas and the rest of his band. Ally is currently showering them with compliments, as Dallas playfully flirts with her. Austin clears his throat, catching everyone's attention.

"I'll see you guys later." Dallas abruptly announces, not letting the chance to glare at Austin pass him by.

"Yeah, us too." Dez excuses, having caught the sense that Austin wants to be alone with Ally for a while. He forcefully grabs Elliot by his arm and literally drags him out of the room.

"Thank you, Ally, for your wonderful words of praises." Elliot says before he and Dez are completely out of the room.

As soon as the three boys left, Austin gently places down the guitar Ally bought for him against the wall.

Ally flashes a small smile when she sees it. She points at it and asks, "I thought you didn't like it?"

Austin shrugs. "I just needed a guitar for the performance." He excuses, although Ally doesn't believe him since Elliot told her all about Austin actually liking the guitar.

After a moment of awkward silence, Ally rocks back and forth on her heels as she clears her throat. "Um…your band's great. I didn't say 'was' because you guys are still awesome." She comments.

Austin chuckles. "Remember what I said about not falling in love with us." He reminds.

"Just don't forget about me when you guys get famous, all right?" Ally plays along.

"Oh, trust me, you are the first person I would _want _to forget." Austin teases, smirking at Ally as he steps closer.

Ally looks away when she notices Austin walking closer and closer to her. And for the second time, she clears her throat.

"Uh…Austin?"

"Hmm?"

"Can I ask you something…about your performance?" Ally shakily questions, uncomfortable with her current proximity with Austin.

"What about it?"

"Why were you looking at me the whole time? No one wrote the lyrics on my face while I was sleeping, right?" Ally asks, glancing up at Austin after realizing there's no point in avoiding his gaze anyway.

"I wasn't looking at you; I was looking at the wall behind you." Austin reasons.

"No, you weren't. I was looking at you and I'm really sure you were only looking at me." Ally counters.

"And why were you looking at me?" Austin retorts, raising an eyebrow.

"Uh…because you're the lead singer. Who am I supposed to look at?"

"Dez? Elliot? Oh, _Dallas!_"

"And why would I be looking at Dallas? And I'm not saying I didn't look at him because I did for a few times, but…"

Austin shrugs. "I just thought that since you guys have this 'attached-to-the-hip' kind of friendship, you would be watching him more than me." He casually points out.

"Austin, what are you trying to get at?"

Shaking his head, Austin replies, "Nothing. Forget this conversation ever happened. There was a redundant usage of the word 'looking' anyway. And I hated it."

Austin grabs a cold bottle of water before storming out of the room, leaving Ally alone backstage confused at the sudden change of his vibe.

* * *

"Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!" Austin stomps his feet around as soon as he heads out of the event center. He keeps on slapping his own forehead, trying to erase what occurred backstage. It was not in his plan, bringing Dallas up. But with Ally, he just can't help it. Dallas has his ways of getting in between him and Ally, even if his physical self has no clue about it.

"Austin?" Dez asks after witnessing Austin's tantrums.

Austin turns around and sees Dez. His shoulders relax a little upon seeing one of his best mates. Even though all he ever wants at the moment is to be alone, Austin still allows Dez to come to him and talk.

"What are you doing?" Dez questions once he and Austin situates themselves on a nearby bench. "You looked like you were throwing tantrums when I came out. Oh, and Ally is looking for you by the way."

Austin shakes his head. "Don't tell her where I am. I need some space from her." He says, running his hand up and down his face.

"Why? Did you two get in another fight?" Resting his elbows on his knees, Dez questions.

"No, no we didn't. It's…it's a different thing this time."

"Huh?"

"I just…I don't get it, Dez." Austin blurts out.

"Get what?"

"How Dallas always manages to get in the way. Every time Ally is involved in something, Dallas _has _to be involved as well. It's like you can never have one without the other." Austin ventures frustratingly.

"Like a buy one get one free?"

Austin gives Dez a sideway glance before snickering. "Yeah, something like that. Ally's the one to buy and Dallas's the inevitable free stuff." He says, chuckling again.

"Anyway, going back," Dez says, "like Dallas said one time in the bowling center, he really likes Ally so I guess he's just trying to get her feelings back by exaggerating his chivalry. And you know what they say, when you see or spend time with a certain person regularly, either one would end up developing feelings for the other. Maybe that's what Dallas is trying to accomplish."

Austin looks at Dez disbelievingly. "And since when did you become an expert with this kind of stuff?" He asks with a huge smile on his face.

Dez shrugs. "Hey, I've got some personal experiences as well. And if I said I didn't learn anything along the way I'd be lying." He confesses.

When Austin doesn't provide him with a reply, Dez furrows his eyebrows before nudging Austin's shoulder with his. "You know, you've never mentioned to us before why you're being so rude to Ally before." He says.

"Dez, you're crossing the line." Austin warns.

"Is it really that personal?" Dez asks incredulously.

"It's actually not _that _personal, but I'm not sure if I can tell you yet. Don't fret, though, someday I will."

"All right." Dez huffs. He pats Austin's knee before getting to his feet and stretching out a few stiff muscles. "I'm heading back inside. What do you want me to say to Ally when she comes looking for you again?"

Austin sighs, glancing up at Dez. "Just tell her you haven't seen me since the performance." He replies.

"Okie dokie," Dez says. "See you later, Austin."

Austin gives him a nod as a response before he watches Dez make his way back inside the event center.

* * *

During lunchtime after the representatives had already served the people they are assigned to, it's finally their time to grab their own lunches. As Ally is currently in line at the buffet table, her eyes can't help but to linger around, looking for a certain tall blonde.

Trish, who's standing behind her, notices. "Ally, who are you looking for?" She asks, finally getting fed up with her friend's head constantly turning from side to side.

"Have you seen Austin?"

Trish shakes her head. "No, I haven't seen him since his performance." She answers and then adds, "Have you asked Elliot or Dez?"

"Dez said the same thing that you did; and I haven't asked Elliot yet actually." Ally responds.

"Ask Elliot what?" Dallas suddenly chirps in, standing behind Trish in the line for the buffet table.

"About Austin." Ally answers.

"What about him?"

"He's been gone for a while now."

"And so? Who cares if he's gone? He's just the extra baggage that no one needs anyway." Dallas whispers the last part, hoping that Ally won't hear him.

Unfortunately, Trish and Ally heard him. Both are quite taken aback by the sudden coldness in their usually chirpy friend's tone of voice.

"You know what?" Ally starts. "I lost my appetite."

"Are you sure?" Trish asks.

"Yep." Ally answers, then turns to Dallas. She hooks a thumb over her shoulder and says, "Dallas? Can I talk to you for a second?"

Dallas only shrugs and follows Ally to a less populated area of the event center: the back of the building where Austin was earlier.

* * *

"Hey, Austin, we're running out of sandwiches," informs one of the student officers in charge of keeping track of the food, "would you go to the back and grab another supply?"

"Sure." Austin answers as he starts to head off to the back of the building where they parked their buses full of their supplies. As he steps out of the back door and just before he rounds a corner, he hears voices. When he recognizes them as Dallas and Ally, he remains hidden in his spot, suddenly not caring about the supply of sandwiches he's supposed to get.

"Who are you and what did you do to Dallas?" Ally questions.

"What are you talking about?" Dallas innocently questions back.

"Cut the crap, Dallas—or whoever you are. Just explain to me what happened back there."

Dallas sighs, reaching up to ruffle his already tousled hair. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry that I got jealous and I acted really cold. It was unusual for me and you know that."

"Why would you be jealous anyway?"

"I'm jealous because I'm scared that your feelings for me would go away. I'm jealous because lately you've been hanging out with Austin a lot." Dallas reveals, his head bowing down in slight embarrassment.

"Whom else am I supposed to hang out with? You're too busy with your senior stuff, Carrie has her student officer thing going on and Elliot is always with her, too often may I add. And Dez…and Trish…they're doing whatever they've been doing lately. And it just so happens that Austin's the only one without anything to do." Ally explains, her hands moving around as she goes.

"That doesn't mean you always have to hang out with him!" Dallas protests.

"Dallas!" Ally whines, running her hand up and down her face in irritation. "I don't get why you're making a big deal out of this! Austin and I are just friends, okay? There's nothing you should be worrying about."

"Yeah…just friends." Dallas chuckles.

"Why are you not getting this?" Ally hisses exasperatingly, already done with Dallas not understanding any of her points.

And in that moment, Dallas completely loses it.

"Gosh, why are you so naïve?" Dallas raises his voice, but not too loud that someone inside the event center will hear them.

"Dallas—"

"I'm scared. I'm jealous. I'm scared that you find him more interesting; I'm scared that you think he's so much better than me. I'm scared that you're going to really _leave _me soon. And yes, I'm jealous that he gets to see you often; I'm jealous that you talk to him; I'm jealous that you're having fun with him. I'm scared…I'm jealous. But that's only because you mean a lot to me." Dallas blurts out as he watches Ally's eyes open wide in surprise. "There! I said it! That's all I've been bottling up for these past few weeks! Months even! Satisfied?"

Ally, after hearing Dallas's confession, loosens her strong stance and glances up at his eyes sadly. Slowly, she removes her arms from being crossed and reaches out to grab ahold of Dallas's hand.

"Please, Ally, just give me one more chance to prove to you that—"

"Dallas—do you know why our relationship really ended?" Ally cuts him off, sniffing afterwards.

"Tell me." Dallas demands.

Ally sucks in a lot of breath before releasing them shakily. She squeezes Dallas's hand gently before speaking.

"It was…it was never in my intent to end our relationship. Heck, I never even wanted it to end. I was having way too much fun with you, Dallas, being the sneaky couple that hid our relationship behind everyone's back even when we know it's going to be a tough job for the both of us." Ally explains, giggling slightly at the memory of when she and Dallas first tried to get away from any forms of suspicions bestowed upon them. "I loved it…I loved our 'rebellious' escapades in the ungodly hours of the night, I loved how we would always go out of town just to go on a date, I loved us…I loved you. And the crazy thing is, I still do."

"Then why did you break up with me…if you said you still have feelings for me?" Dallas inquires, his eyebrows knitting together in pure bafflement.

"My parents…they, uh…they found out. I don't know how they did or who told them, but for some unknown reason they found out I was going out with you." Ally reveals, her eyes starting to water as her mind recollects the first time she saw her parents being so terrifyingly furious at her. "They were so mad, Dallas because they sent me here in Miami for educational purposes, not for me to go and skip around with a guy in my arms. I can never explain the venom in their voices. Even though they only scolded me through my phone, I can just imagine the fire burning in their eyes. I would _never _forget that moment for the rest of my life."

"Ally—"

"It even came to the point when I started to think my own parents are going to disown me. They were so _mad_, Dallas. I don't think mad or furious are enough to describe how…how…." Ally struggles to finish her sentence before moving on to another point, "They made it crystal clear that they don't want me to be in any kind of relationship, and that education comes first and I totally turned my back on that."

"Shh…" Dallas steps closer to Ally, wrapping his arms around her tiny frame as he continuously rubs her back.

"In that moment I realized how much of a failure I am. I betrayed my parents, so I decided that breaking up with you was the best thing I could do for them." Ally confesses. "As much as I didn't want to, I did it. And it's not only because I don't want my parents to be mad at me longer, but also because I love you, Dallas. I just had to let you go. I'm sorry."

Out of surprise, Austin accidentally steps on a twig and it snaps.

"Oh, shoot." Austin says a little too loud, unfortunately grabbing both Dallas and Ally's attention.

"Hey," Dallas calls, "who's there?"

Ally looks over Dallas's shoulder and she cannot deny the familiar blonde hair and black beanie she catches before he completely hides out of sight.

* * *

**I'm sorry if I disappointed you with the song choice. I know you were all probably expecting an Austin Moon song, but the song ****_Voodoo Doll _****by 5 Seconds Of Summer is just so perfect and it fits so well with Austin and Ally's current ****relationship. I didn't put the entire song in this chapter, so if you wanna go and give it a listen, just search for it on YouTube. Unfortunately, they don't have a studio version yet, but it's coming really soon!**

**Also, the band name! Aaah! I chose SnookieB123's suggestion because it was just so simple and I liked it very much. I just wanna point out that the band name is not pronounced as the word "dead" itself, but it's like you have to say each letter, and not read it as the entire word. Did that make sense? I personally think it didn't.**

**But, anyway, I really have to go now! Let me know what you think! (Also, anyone a fan of 5 Seconds Of Summer? Can't wait to watch them tonight at the BBMAs!)**

**Thanks! :D**


	11. Chapter 11

**So, I am once again injured. I was riding my nickel board yesterday and I slipped and tripped on my own foot. I attacked the floor obviously. The knee that was scraped pretty badly was the same knee that was dislocated two months ago. And now I can ****legitimately****feel my knee pulsing. IT HURTS SO BAD. And because I'm currently in my bed right now, and ****can't****properly walk, I decided to write this chapter up. It's quite short, but don't really want to give out too much just yet.**

**ALSO! IMPORTANT REMINDER! I revised Chapter 9 and Chapter 10. I added an extra thing at the bridge scene between A&A in Chapter 9 so you better read that in order for a few things in Chapter 10 to make sense. However, the thing that I added in the end of Chapter 10 is VERY IMPORTANT. Here's a hint: Ally finally told Dallas the real reason for their breakup and guess who heard all of it?**

**But anyway, here's the ****_short _****Chapter 11 for all of you.**

**Review Reply:**

*** GUEST: YAASSS! Disconnected by 5SOS was originally my first choice for the song that Austin wrote for Ally, but then Voodoo Doll played on my phone and I was like, "Yes, this is the official song." But I'm starting to consider Disconnected again in the future chapters of the story. So, watch out for that I guess?**

* * *

**Chapter 11**

Later that day, the representatives are off to their assigned tasks, each of them pairing up into groups of two or three. Since Carrie is a student officer, she's in charge of making sure the representatives are where they are supposed to be and not goofing off with others. She checks off the names of the ones that she's already seen working properly or is off to their assigned quarters. However, when she gets to Ally's name, it has not been checked yet but her partner's name has already been.

"Hmm…Ally," Carrie mumbles, tapping the eraser of her pencil on her chin as she browses through her clipboard once again, double checking Ally's supposed task. "She should be in the day care by now with—"

"Carrie!" Ally, who suddenly comes out of nowhere, calls out to her friend.

Carrie's shoulders slump in relief. "Thank goodness you're here! I thought you got abducted or something." She jokes.

"And they keep on saying I'm the one with the craziest imagination in the group," Ally replies with a playful tone of voice.

"Where were you anyway?" Carrie asks, checking off Ally's name on her clipboard.

"Oh, I was helping out with the cleaning in the event center." Ally replies, trying to sniff quietly and wipe away any form of evidence that she's been crying. It's a good thing Carrie is distracted at the moment. "Why are you so eager to learn my whereabouts?"

"You are badly needed in the day care, young lady." Carrie answers, pointing the eraser end of her pencil at Ally.

"And why is that?" Ally asks, frolicsomely placing her hands on her hips.

"Apparently, Austin is terrible with kids. He already made two girls cry in the firs ten minutes."

"Austin?" Ally questions, her head tilting to the side. "I thought I was doing day care duty with Dallas?"

"Really?"

Ally nods her head exaggeratingly. "Yeah, he volunteered and I'm pretty sure he also signed up for it. You know how Dallas is, right? He adores children!"

"I'm not quite sure, Ally. It might just be a mix-up or something, but it says on my clipboard that Dallas switched tasks with Austin." Carrie informs, turning her clipboard so it's facing Ally.

"When did this happen?" Ally narrows her eyes as she looks at the clipboard.

Carrie shrugs, having no idea when the switch actually transpired. She's pretty sure that once everyone had signed up for the tasks the want to do, there's no going back, especially no switching.

_Since when did their coordinator approve of this? _Carrie thinks.

"Anyway," Ally starts, "let's sit by each other on the way home, all right? I'll see you later."

* * *

As soon as Ally enters the day care, Carrie eyes Dallas making his way towards her. And to her, it looks like he's beyond furious.

"Since when did I say I wanted to do the bathroom duty?" Dallas exasperatingly inquires. "Because I'm pretty sure I made it clear that I wanted to do the day care the moment I put _every letter of my goddamn name _on that stupid sign-up sheet!"

Carrie bites her lower lip nervously as everything in her head suddenly clicks into place. "Oh, dear."

* * *

"Austin, come play with me!"

"Austin, can you read me a story?"

"Austin, I need to go potty!"

"Austin, why did you make Ashley cry?"

"Austin, I'm hungry!"

"Austin—"

"Kids! Settle down first, please? Ally is not yet here, so let's wait for her before we can do everything, okay? Trust me, everything's going to be more fun when she gets here." Austin raises his voice since his normal volume would be overpowered by the numerous clamors of the children.

"But Austin," a little girl named Madison whines, "I really need to go to the potty!"

"Are you not wearing diapers or something?" Austin questions.

"I can't because I'm being potty-trained."

"But you're a girl and I can't go inside the girls' bathroom—"

"Ausstiiiiin, I really need to go!"

"Ally's coming so let's just—oh, whom am I kidding? Come on, let's go." Austin says, putting his hand out for Madison to take. As soon as the little girl grabs his hand, he ushers her to the girls' bathroom.

"Okay, I'll be right here waiting for you, all right?" Austin says once they are both outside the bathroom. He leans his entire frame on the wall as he crosses his arms over his chest.

"No, you come with me." Madison protests, tugging at Austin's hand.

"Madison, I'm a boy. Boys are not supposed to go inside the girls' bathroom." Austin softly says, squatting down to Madison's eye level.

"Please?"

"How about this? You'll go inside the bathroom and be the big girl that I know you are. I'll leave the door open so you know I'm still here. Is that a deal?" Austin offers, smiling comfortably at Madison.

"Okay." Madison finally agrees, pushing the bathroom door open and watching as Austin stands by the frame, his foot preventing the door from completely closing.

Austin hears a stall door squeaking open and then closing, followed by the sound of a lock clicking in place. He also sooner hears Madison's low soft humming, making a smirk play upon his lips.

"Are you done?" Austin questions after a while.

"Just a second, Austin." Madison answers.

After a moment, Austin hears the flush and Madison soon exits the stall. She goes straight to the sink to wash her hands like she's been taught, but even the ones built for little girls like her is too high.

"Austin!" Madison calls out. "I can't reach the sink! I need to wash my hands so I can get rid of the germs."

Setting aside his reluctance, Austin removes his foot from the door and completely enters the bathroom. He immediately sees Madison struggling so he takes her by her underarms and gently hoists her up. The little girl takes her time washing her hands and squirting soap on the palm of her hands; she rubs her hands together to cover her hands with the soap and then rinsing it afterwards.

When Madison's finally done and already dried her hands, she and Austin exit the bathroom and Austin has never been so happy in his life to see Ally standing amidst the crowd of children.

* * *

"Ally? Why is your hair really curly?"

Austin overhears one of the children asking Ally as soon as he lets Madison go to resume her playing. Seeing that she's about to open her mouth to respond, Austin decides to intervene.

"Hey, kids!" Austin cheers, instantly grabbing Ally's attention. "It looks like you've already met Ally."

Madison skips back to his side. She grabs one of his hands and wiggles it, making Austin look down at her.

"What is it, beautiful girl?" Austin asks.

"She's pretty, Austin." Madison frankly states, grinning up at her tall friend.

Austin chuckles before looking at Ally with a smile on his face. "Yeah, she is…very pretty." He mumbles almost inaudible for the little girl to hear. His smile soon falters once he realizes what he just said.

_I don't want to like her_, he keeps telling himself, _Dallas likes her and she undeniably likes him back. There's no chance._

"If you said she's pretty, does that mean you love her the way my daddy loved my mommy?" Madison queries.

Austin shakes his head and laughs out loud, grabbing Ally's attention once again from across the room. "No, no, I don't. She's, uh, she's just a friend. A good one." He replies.

All of a sudden, Madison releases Austin's hand and skips her way towards Ally. The latter girl beams upon the sight of the approaching little girl. When Madison snakes an arm around Ally's back and when Ally does the same, the little girl leans closer to Ally's ear and whispers something.

From across the room, Austin watches with a terrified expression, assuming that Madison is telling Ally how Austin thinks she's pretty. Soon after, Austin's shoulders slump in relief as he realizes that Madison only asked Ally if she wants to play with her.

"Okay, we'll play House and I'll be your mommy." Ally tells Madison, a friendly smile plastered on her features. "One question though: who's going to be your daddy?"

Madison taps her chin as if she's thinking who's going to play her father. Not longer than five seconds, Madison happily points her finger at Austin.

"Austin's going to be my daddy!" Madison exclaims, making Austin's eyes widen in surprise.

Soon, he notices Madison and Ally making their way to him. The little girl is chanting something excitingly as Ally is being legitimately dragged. When both are finally in front of Austin, Madison promptly takes Austin's and Ally's hands in hers before intertwining it together.

"There you go!" Madison cheers, stepping back in admiration as she dreamily gazes up at her 'parents.'

"Madison, do you think this is really necessary?" Ally questions as nicely as she can manage.

The little girl jounces her head. "Yes, I used to see my mommy and daddy do it." She answers.

"Madison…" Ally is about to kindly complain one more time when she suddenly feels Austin tightening his hold on her hand. She feels him leaning closer before she feels his warm breath tickling her earlobe.

"Better give what the child wants." Austin whispers.

"But Austin…"

"Ally, just this one time…it's not like we have to do this for the rest of our life." Austin says, giving her quick sideway glance.

All that Ally can do is sigh and nod her head in agreement.

"Okay, kids; let's play!" Austin exclaims ebulliently causing for the little kids to cheer in excitement. "Now…where's my little princess?"

While all of them are playing House (Austin and Ally end up having more than a dozen kids), Madison notices how Ally is always attempting to get herself as far away as possible from Austin. Because she already witnessed the same situation with her parents before, Madison decides to take matters into her own hands. She takes the jump rope from her basket of toys before taking Austin by his hand as well as Ally and ties their hands together, keeping her mouth shut and ignoring any protests coming from both elderly.

"Madison, what are you doing?" Sweetly, Ally asks. When the little girl doesn't provide her with an answer, she adds, "Madison, why are you tying our hands together? Oh, I know! You're a police officer and we're the bad guys? Oh, man, you caught us."

Madison ignores her and beams up at Austin as soon as she's done roping her pretend parents' hands together.

When the little girl skips away, Austin glances to his right in order to catch a glimpse of Ally from the corner of his eye.

"The farther you distance yourself away from me, the closer we end up together." Austin comments.

"I wasn't distancing myself away from you." Ally protests.

"Oh, really? Then why do you keep excusing yourself every time we end up in the same area of the day care?" Austin asks, quirking an eyebrow.

"I have reasons, okay? And my excuses are legitimate. I'm not avoiding you, if that's the point you're trying to get across." Ally answers.

"That wasn't my point—"

"Did you hear anything, Austin?" Ally interrupts.

"What?"

"I saw you, you know. I know you were there when I was talking to Dallas earlier." Ally clarifies.

Austin sighs. "I know it was wrong and…wait, is that why you're avoiding me? You're mad at me for eavesdropping?"

"I just said I wasn't avoiding you. And I'm not mad."

"Look, can we talk about this some other time? The day care is really not the most ideal place to be discussing something like this. Besides, we're supposed to be husband and wife, remember?" Austin states, wiggling their tied up hands.

"Fine," Ally agrees, "but don't ever think that you're getting away with this."

"I'm not even planning to. I need to talk to you about something anyway." Austin responds.

"Should I be worried?" Ally teases.

"I think you should."

Austin and Ally soon erupt into laughter, making their pretend children to look at them joyfully. And being the ever-playful bunch, the kids demanded for Austin to kiss Ally on the cheek.

Ally shakes her head. "No, kids. There's not going to be any kissing happening. All of you are still too young for that kind of stuff." She scolds, giggling about how adorable and innocent the kids are.

Out of the blue, Ally feels Austin's lips pressing against her cheek in a chaste kiss.

"Austin!" Ally exclaims, her eyes dilating in surprise and disbelief. "We're surrounded with a bunch of four-year-olds! You're not allowed to do that!"

"They wanted me to kiss their mommy, so I gave them what they want." Austin reasons, a smirk already forming on his lips.

"One of the goals of this pretend-parenthood is to not spoil the kids. It's not necessary to give them everything they ask for, Austin." Ally explains, sounding more maternal than she originally intends to.

"Whatever you say, Mrs. Moon."

Ally abruptly looks up at Austin, unsure whether she heard him right. She goggles at the side of his side before finally looking away, not wanting Austin to see the shade of red creeping upon her cheeks. Even though it's pretend, she feels giddy about the fact that Austin called her his wife. Ally doesn't know what made her think that away, but to her the title suddenly made her feel the cliché "butterflies in her stomach," something she never thinks she's capable of experiencing ever again.

* * *

"Dallas, what are you doing?"

The said boy abruptly leans away from the day care window and faces the owner of the female voice that just barely called his attention. He reaches up behind his neck to play with the ends of his hair.

"Nothing…" Dallas responds slowly knowing it's not going to work since he's obviously already caught in the act.

Carrie presses her lips together and cocks an eyebrow at Dallas. "Really? By looking through the window of the day care, possibly checking on Austin and Ally, you're doing nothing?" She says.

"Yes…?"

Carrie rolls her eyes and trudges toward Dallas. "Let me see what has peaked your interest." She informs, as she herself looks through the window only to find Austin and Ally's hands tied together with a jump rope. "Ah, I see."

"I still can't believe he switched my tasks with his. I'm already getting some bad vibes from him, and he's only making everything worse." Glaring at his blonde friend inside the day care, Dallas spats.

"Look, Dallas, I don't know what's happening between you and Austin but that has got to stop. I'm pretty sure Austin and Ally's hands being tied together are no big deal. They're in a day care with a bunch of children, I'm one hundred percent sure the kids are responsible for that." Carrie says as a matter of fact before storming off to resume checking on other quarters.

Dallas remains in his spot, his eyes still hard on Austin's face. He watches him for a while, laughing and joking around with the children, before his eyes gravitate towards Ally. She, as well, suggests happiness in her eyes. Dallas can't deny the fact that Ally is often times happier with Austin than with him, but he won't let that be a hazard for him in getting _his _girl back.

He already lost Ally once, and now that he's positive that he still has her feelings secured in a briefcase with him, he's not going to let her slip away from his fingers for the second time.

* * *

**I can't guarantee an update next Saturday because I'm revising my outline. Sorry, I just wanted to change a few things and every time I had to change something, some parts of the story get affected. But I'll try my best to get something done before Saturday next week. I only have three days left of school anyway.**

**HELLO SUMMER!**


	12. Chapter 12

**I managed to write this chapter without the help of my outline! I'm still on the works of revising it, so chapter 13 and up may not be as ready as the previous ones, but I'm gonna have to work on it since I'm already out of school! Weepee!**

**Anyway, please enjoy.**

* * *

**Chapter 12**

It's officially spring break week.

Brooke is out with her friends (she's barely in the apartment ever since she found out about Ally and Dallas's secret relationship as she's trying to distance herself from her cousin before she does something she knows she'll regret in the future) while Ally is in her room, trying to finish off any homework so that she won't have to worry about it later in the week.

In the middle of solving a Calculus problem, Ally hears someone calling her name from outside. She scrunches her eyebrows together before she decides to head out to her balcony to check who it is.

"Ally!"

"Austin?" Ally calls back out of confusion.

"Meet me outside your house!"

Ally wastes no time. She hurriedly slips on her to-go shoes, grabs her camera from her study desk, and sprints down her staircase and out of her apartment. She beams up at Austin once she's finally standing right in front of him.

Austin holds out his hand for Ally to take.

Ally looks down at it skeptically. "What are you doing?" She questions.

"Come on, we're going somewhere." Austin answers, urging Ally to take his hand.

"Where are we going?" Ally asks, finally grabbing ahold of Austin's hand, not missing the fact that he gives it a brief squeeze before letting their intertwined hands swing back and forth in between them.

"Remember we were supposed to be talking about something? We started it yesterday at the day care and I said that we should find someplace appropriate?" Austin recollects, his thumb grazing over Ally's knuckles rubbing circles in each one.

Ally, on the other hand, tries to ignore the tingly feeling Austin's touch is sending out to her. She attempts to convince herself that this hand holding completely means nothing, especially if it's happening the day after she reveals to Dallas that she still feels the same way about him and that nothing has changed.

"Oh, that? Yeah…I kind of brushed it off my shoulder. I thought that you overhearing my conversation with Dallas are kind of not a big deal. It's not like it's something I should be keeping, right? We are both good friends of Dallas and I think that you at least deserved to know our past relationship." Ally explains.

"So…do you really still have feelings for him?" Austin interrogates, looking to his right to face Ally as he awaits her answer.

"Well…" Ally trails off, not really sure how she's going to explain what she's currently feeling. "Dallas and I ended just almost two months ago now. Feelings are not something you can just rip off of your system right away. It takes time…"

"So you still have feelings for him, basically."

Ally shrugs. "It's getting kind of complicated, to be honest. I don't know what made me think that, but it just is."

Austin gazes at Ally once again and notices that she has camera with her. He points at it, which instantaneously catches the girl's interest.

"Why do you have a camera?" Austin questions.

"In case you didn't know, I'm currently obsessing over photography. I got used to carrying it with me wherever I go." Ally explains, and then she suddenly remembers something. She unintentionally removes her hand from Austin's and excitingly grabs her camera. "Speaking of photography, I need to show you something."

"What is it?"

"Just hang on." Ally replies as she briskly thumbs through her gallery of pictures, looking for that one certain photo she took probably more than a couple of weeks ago. When she finds it, she beams. "Here, take a look."

Austin takes the camera from Ally's grasp and he raises his eyebrows upon seeing the subject of the photo.

"It's me." Austin announces.

"Duh, who else could it be? Unless you have a twin we know nothing about." Ally teases, rolling her eyes at him.

"Have you been stalking me?" Austin retorts, handing the camera back to Ally.

"For your information, Mr. Moon, this picture was taken unintentionally. It was not my intent to do so." Ally responds coltishly formal. "It was the day that Dallas picked you and Dez up to go and have a boys' day out or something at who knows where. I was supposed to take a picture of Dallas, but then your humongous head decided to block him entirely just as I clicked the shutter button."

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry." Austin plays along, placing a hand on his heart. "But, hey, at least I gave you a better picture."

Ally snickers, punching Austin in the arm, sending him backwards.

"Wow, your punching is improving." Austin says sarcastically.

"Austin Monica, you are starting to get on my nerves." Ally warns.

"Really? Then why are you trying to hold back your laugh?"

"Oh, shut up, let's just go there." Ally responds, pointing at the playground behind Austin.

"Ooh, playground!"

"Oh, my goodness, I didn't know I'm hanging out with a three-year-old!" Ally teases, finally letting out the laugh she's been trying to hold back earlier. She immediately grabs her camera and takes a quick snap of Austin.

"I am not a three-year-old!" Austin counters. "I just love playgrounds, that's all. There's just something about them…" he trails off.

Ally continues to take candid pictures of Austin climbing to the very top of the slide before he situates himself right there. He notices her looking at him and urges her to come up. With a roll of her eyes, Ally starts for the ladder. When she finally reaches the top and already occupied the spot Austin saved for her, she looks at the side of his head and smiles. She raises her camera once again and takes another photo of him, she smiling and admiring how peaceful Austin looks at the moment.

"You're staring at me." Austin announces.

"I'm aware, Austin Monica."

"Quit calling me that. You're not my mom." Austin replies.

"Well too bad, huh? I guess your mom's not the only one allowed to call you that."

Austin only snickers as response as he remains looking at the horizon.

Ally scoots closer to the boy, closing any gap between them. It surprises her though that Austin does no attempt to inch away like he normally does before. She raises a hand to grab Austin's but she hesitates, keeping in mind that she may already be crossing the line.

Austin, however, notices her attempt and decides to take matters into his own hands. Without averting his eyes away from the horizon, he takes Ally's hand and holds it gently. He gives it a light squeeze before he lets his thumb circle each of her knuckles for the second time.

"Hey, uh…you said something earlier about playgrounds. Would you care to shed some light upon me?" Ally suddenly asks, feeling like starting a conversation with Austin.

The boy averts his eyes away from the distance to gaze at the girl next to him. Austin takes a quick look at Ally's lips before meeting her eyes.

"My mom used to take me to playgrounds every single day. It's what I look forward to everyday after school. I loved it because I get to play everyday, I get to meet new friends…and then she…she stopped. She stopped taking me to playgrounds. I realized she only did it because I'm getting too old for it. But I know deep inside me that there's always going to be that one part of me where I hope she'll only day take me to a playground again no matter how old I am." Austin explains.

"Hey, everyone's a kid at heart, right?" Ally replies, nudging his shoulder with hers, which earns a small chuckle from Austin.

"But most specifically, I love the slide. I know you're already thinking about that cliché metaphor about life, but…I just thought that…we work so hard to get to the top of the slide but when we go down, the fun of it all only lasts for a short matter of time. Makes me feel like the hard work wasn't worth it at all." Austin says before looking straightly at Ally's eyes. "It's the same thing with love. You work so hard—you struggle—you gave your all to get the person you want, and when you got her and you go down the slide together, the pleasure and the ecstasy of the relationship will only last for a short while. It's probably because he didn't put so much effort as he only climbed the smallest slide, and when the least effort is put into something, nothing is ever going to work. So, what I'm saying is that always go for someone who is willing to conquer even the most massive slide for you. Don't settle for anything less because you won't end up happy, trust me."

Austin lies down after, the rest of his legs already on the slide. Because he's still holding hands with Ally, she follows suit as well. She rests her head on his chest, the feelings she have for Dallas that keeps holding her back is suddenly residing at the very back of her head.

"I only asked for a brief explanation, not indulge into the deepest reasons, Austin." Ally mumbles.

"There's actually no short version for the explanation. Besides, you're the first person who didn't laugh at me for loving playgrounds. I told the boys once and they laughed their heads off. Well, Dez kind of understood but he ended up making fun of me anyway." Austin responds, taking a quick look down at Ally, his lips lightly brushing against her hair.

Silence blankets the two of them for a while, but not until Ally speaks up.

"It's getting late, we better get back." She informs, already getting herself into an upright position.

Austin takes her by her wrist and gently pulls her back down. "No, stay." He orders, stretching an arm out horizontally for Ally to lie her head down on this time.

"Austin…"

"Ally, it's like two in the afternoon. Apparently, it's already 'too late' for you." Austin reasons, cutting Ally off even before she can whine about the time.

"I have homework to finish." Ally counters.

"You have the rest of the week to do them."

"It's Calculus—"

"So? You're smart, you can figure everything out in no time."

Ally presses her lips together, thinking that there is no way she's going to get herself away from the situation. It's not like she doesn't like the moment she's currently having with Austin (she even enjoys it, to be honest), but she just wants to avoid the endless possibilities of how their alone time may turn out. She wants to prevent whatever it may be before everything gets out of hand—before everything is too late.

"You just want me here to keep you company, am I right? So other people won't think of you as childish when they see you lying alone in the playground?" Ally teases, poking Austin on his side continuously.

Austin shakes his head. "I just want you here…so stay." He mumbles, almost inaudible for the both of them.

"All right, Mr. Cheesy Moon. I'll stay." Ally giggles; taking her camera again and quickly snapping a picture of Austin with him shielding his face with his hand.

"Okay, you've been taking a lot of pictures of my face. How about I take pictures of your face _twice _as much as the amount of photos of me?" Austin suggests, removing the camera strap from Ally's neck and putting it on his.

"Hey!" Ally complains, laughing.

Austin starts to take pictures, his finger not stopping from clicking the shutter button. In a short amount of time, he has already stored pictures of Ally laughing, her smiling so big as she looks up at the sky, her hand covering her face, just to mention a few. Then, Ally snatches the camera from Austin's grasp and starts to take pictures of the two of them together. Constantly, she has to instruct Austin to make a different facial expression for the picture, as he's mostly just smiling at all of them.

* * *

Ally's eyelids slowly open and when she catches a small glimpse of her surroundings, her eyes instantly snaps open, her body jolting upright awakening Austin in the process.

"Ally, what the f—?"

"What time is it?" Ally frantically asks.

Austin glances at his phone that he has taken out of his pocket upon waking up. With a groan, he answers, "Quarter to seven."

"Goddamnit, Austin. We've been sleeping here in the playground for almost five hours!" Ally informs, scrambling to get herself down from the slide without actually taking _the _slide.

"Go to my apartment. In my medicine cabinet, you'll find a bottle full of chill pills. I highly recommend taking five of it." Austin teases; noticing how frenzy Ally is acting at the moment.

"Now is not the time to joke around, Austin. I need to get home." Ally replies, finally managing to get herself out of the slide.

"Why? Wait. Let me guess: you have homework to finish?"

"Brooke's almost home. I need to be there before her or she might think I'm with Dallas." Ally explains, not really being watchful of everything that comes out of her mouth.

"Dallas? Why can't you just say you were with me?" Austin suggests, trailing behind Ally as they both power walked back to their respective apartments.

"Brooke doesn't believe anything I say anymore, Austin."

"Why?"

"It's complicated." Ally states. When she gets to the front door of her apartment, she swivels around to give Austin the friendliest smile she can muster at the moment. "Good night, I'll see you…some other time."

* * *

As soon as Ally shuts the front door close, she scans her apartment and feels how empty it really is. Since Brooke is rarely home anymore, it's just her and the rest of the house. She reaches for her pocket to fish out her phone and immediately dials Trish's number, her breathing still a little jagged from all the power walking she did.

"Hey, are you okay?" Trish asks right away after hearing Ally's heavy pants through her phone.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. I was just…uh…running." Ally reasons falsely.

"Oh, okay." Trish says.

"Listen, are you doing anything tonight…wait, are you doing anything right now?" Ally questions as her panting is slowly starting to normalize.

"I just left Dez's actually. Why? Do you want me to come over? I'm on my way there now anyway." Trish responds.

"Yes, please. I have something to talk to you about—wait, why were you at Dez's?"

"I'm starting to think you haven't been running at all. You're nervous about something." Ignoring Ally's query about Dez, Trish ventures.

"Well…kind of…I was power walking, not running. And I'm kind of nervous and kind of panicking at the same time." Ally replies.

"Open the door, then, I'm already here." Trish says before hanging up the call.

Ally throws her phone over to the nearest couch before turning around to open the door for her friend. The moment Trish walks in, Ally instantly stalks tiresomely towards the same couch her phone had landed in.

"What's up with you?" Trish asks, watching her friend being unusually sluggish.

"What about you? Why were you at Dez's?" Ally retorts teasingly, an eyebrow raised and a smirk playing on her lips.

Trish shut her eyes tightly before letting out a heavy sigh. "That's not what I came here for, Ally. You're having a crisis, whatever it is, and I'm here to talk about it." She says, claiming the spot next to Ally on the couch.

"Fine, but I'm not going to let this go." Ally replies, referring to Trish and Dez.

"Ally," Trish warns, using her solid maternal tone of voice.

Ally sighs before running her hands through her brown hair. "I can't…I don't actually know if this is a crisis but…Austin and—"

"Austin?" Trish interrupts.

"Yes, him. He came to my house like five hours ago asking for me to come meet him outside my apartment. I met with him and we went for a walk, which ended up in the playground. We were talking about stuff and for some reason we ended up falling asleep…and then…I just—I just kind of took off." Ally explains, her hands constantly running through her hair and her eyes keep looking at everywhere but refusing to meet Trish's eyes.

"Is he still there then?" Trish questions.

Ally shakes her head. "No, we woke up at the same time. I don't know, Trish, I just…I just felt weird about it…like…like it was wrong. What we were doing was wrong." She clarifies.

"There's nothing wrong about it, Ally. You two were just hanging out and then you ended falling asleep on the playground. It's not like you guys did the—"

"Shh! Don't even mention anything about that. You're making everything worse." Ally intervenes, holding a finger against Trish's lips.

Trish raises her hands up in surrender.

"I know there's nothing wrong with what happened. It's just that, for some reason, I feel like I was cheating on someone—"

"Dallas?"

Ally stops fidgeting and turns her head to the left to look at Trish. Slowly, she nods her head.

"Ally, you and him are not even a couple! As far as I'm aware, you and him were never one. It's probably because you and Dallas are so tight-knit that you feel like you're really on a relationship with him. There's nothing wrong, Ally, there's no cheating happening." Trish states, reaching for Ally and pulling her closer.

Ally is about to counter by saying that Dallas and her really _was _in a relationship before and that they just barely confessed that they still have feelings for one another two months after the breakup, but then she suddenly remembered that Trish knows nothing about the relationship.

"I just don't get why it felt so weird with Austin." Ally whispers, resting her head on Trish's lap as the latter girl caresses her hair. "I'm so tired…" she mumbles soon after followed by a small yawn.

"I really think you should open your eyes sometimes, Ally. There are things that you cannot see that others can." Trish advises as she looks down at her friend and notices how her breathing is starting to become even, a clear sign that she's already asleep.

* * *

"Hey," Austin greets Dez upon setting foot in their shared apartment's living room, "I just barely saw Trish walking outside. Do you know that?"

Dez hums in response, his eyes fixated on his video game. Apparently, Austin fails to notice Elliot is there as well.

"She was here earlier." Elliot says he as well can't take his eyes off of the television screen.

"Oh, okay." Austin deadpans. "Well, I'm heading upstairs…in case anyone needs me."

Dez and Elliot avert their eyes away from the screen to look at each other with knitted eyebrows. Elliot raises an eyebrow as though he's questioning Dez, and Dez only shrugs in reply.

"Austin, are you okay?" Elliot asks after Dez pauses the video game.

Austin flashes a small smile and rubs the back of his ear. He nods tiresomely before speaking, "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit tired, I guess."

"Are you sure it's not about a certain girl?" Elliot questions again.

Austin sighs.

"She's not getting your hints, isn't she?" Dez asks slowly and quietly.

Austin shakes his head disappointingly. "No, no…she's not getting it all. And I don't think she ever will. She's completely blinded by…uh, someone else."

* * *

**Just to be clear on the last few paragraphs of the chapter, the thing with Austin asking Ally to meet him outside her apartment is totally a plan thought out by Austin, Dez, and Elliot. They planned it just so Austin could start dropping hints at Ally. On Ally's part, she's already starting to get confused with both Austin and Dallas, while Austin still thinks that Ally is still head over heels for Dallas that's why she didn't get his hints. It's just a misassumption, I guess? I hope that made sense.**

**Anyway, let me know what you think! I'm getting too excited for the entire story.**

**P.S. I'm rethinking the story's title. Any suggestions?**


	13. Chapter 13

**Hello, beautiful people! I updated early this week. My knee is already healing rather quickly, but sadly, as it heals, my fever rises. Yes, I am sick, which is not fun to have during the summer. It's already too hot and your body is also getting hot as well. But anyway, here's the 13th chapter. I must say, I'm pretty impressed with it. This is going into my favorite chapters list.**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 13**

The following day, Ally is going to the grocery store to run a few errands, for herself and for Brooke, since she left her a note that lists everything she needs. As she's heading to her car, she notices Austin outside of his apartment as well, also making his way to his car. And because she's still feeling that weird thing every time she sees or thinks about Austin, she quickly shifts her eyes away from him, also in hopes that he won't be able to catch her.

Unfortunately, Austin sees her.

Austin whistles to get her attention, and because she only feels weird and not irritated with what happened yesterday at the playground with the boy, Ally turns to him and grins so wide, it relieves Austin for some reason. She waves at him before Austin starts to jog towards her.

"Where are you heading to?" Austin asks, placing his hands on his hips.

Ally lifts up the piece of paper that contains everything she and Brooke need for the apartment. "It's that time of the month. Brooke decided it was time to stock up our fridge again." She answers, giggling slightly after.

Austin nods. "Me too. Dez was supposed to do it since I did the groceries last month, but…he's been hanging out with Trish lately. He excused that she might arrive in any moment." He replies.

"Yeah, I've noticed. What's up with that anyway?" Ally questions, she as well putting her hands on her hips.

"Who knows?" Austin informs falsely, keeping in mind the pact he made with Dez about keeping whatever his relationship with Trish is as a secret.

"But anyway, I have to go. It was nice talking to you." Ally says before she starts to unlock her car.

Austin places his hand on top of Ally's, stopping her from completely unlocking her car. He smiles down at her when she looks at him with a surprised yet puzzled look.

"You're not driving…I am." Austin states, his hand attempting to grab the key from Ally's grasp as he resumes looking into her eyes.

"But…aren't you going somewhere too?"

"I am." Austin answers. "But I just thought that since we are both doing groceries anyway, might as well just go to the same one and take one vehicle."

"I shop at the organic one, Austin." Ally informs as a matter of fact.

"So do I."

"No, you don't."

"Yes, I do."

"Dez doesn't even like anything organic." Ally protests.

"Of course he does."

"Since when?"

"The day he set us up at Betsy's Diner." Austin answers straightforwardly.

"And how do I know that's for sure?"

"He even said so himself, and I quote, 'People change, Austin, and so do their taste buds'." Austin quotes, raising his tone a little higher as to mimic Dez's voice.

"I am still not convinced." Ally informs, turning back to her car to unlock it only to realize her key has been secretly stolen out of her dainty hands. "Hey, give me back my keys!"

Austin raises the keys so Ally won't be able to reach it because she's a foot smaller than him.

"Hey, that's not fair!" Ally complains, jumping up to retrieve her keys.

"What's not fair?" Austin interrogates innocently.

"This!"

"What?"

"You being so goddamn tall! Gosh, why do you have to be such a giant?" Ally answers.

Austin guffaws as he watches the small girl jump up and down trying to get her car keys from him. It's fun to watch at first, but he soon realizes he's done enough. He's tortured her enough already.

"Fine," Austin says, "I'll give you your keys _if _you let me drive your car."

"But I haven't driven my car for so long! I want to take my baby out for a spin myself." Ally counters.

"Okay, how about this? We're going to make a deal, all right?" Austin suggests, putting his tired arm down and placing it behind his back as for Ally to not snatch the keys away.

Ally groans. "I can't promise I'll agree to it."

"Here's the deal: _I _will allow you to drive _your _car from here to there and back, _but _you have to allow me to take you out for dinner." Austin offers, gazing sincerely into Ally's eyes.

"Tonight?" Ally asks, raising her eyebrows.

Austin shrugs. "It doesn't have to be tonight if you're not in the mood for it. You can choose when and where."

"Wait. Back up. _I _have to _choose _the place?"

"Yeah, what's wrong with that?" Austin asks.

"You're the one who asked me to dinner and I agreed without any forms of hesitation or whatsoever. The least you could do is to choose the place." Ally complains.

Austin stretches his hand out for Ally to shake. "So…is that a deal?"

Ally smiles before taking Austin's hand and shaking it, officially accepting their agreement. "Deal."

* * *

Austin and Ally finally arrived at the grocery store. Austin wraps an arm around Ally's shoulder as she grabs a single cart for the both of them.

"Okay, let me just take out my list." Ally mumbles as she shoves her hand in her short's pocket. When she finally has it out, she browses through the entire list and glances at Austin. "This is going to take a long time."

"It's either you or Brooke, but someone in your apartment is a complete human food machine. I've never seen anyone with this massive list before." Austin says as he takes Ally's list and scans through it himself.

Ally chuckles. "Well, since Brooke has been out lately, she takes a lot of things from our kitchen and brings them to her friends." She explains.

"Because I don't really need to fetch that much stuff, we can split your list in half and then let's just meet back here in the same spot when we're done. Is that all right with you?" Austin suggests, questioningly raising an eyebrow at Ally.

"That will do."

As soon as Ally responds, Austin tears the list in half and handed the bottom part to her.

"I'll see you later then." Ally says before watching Austin take a cart for himself.

"Wait." Austin raises his voice to grab Ally's attention. "You have my number, right? Because I totally don't have yours—I used to hate you, remember?"

"I do have your number, Austin Monica, because unlike you I'm actually a nice human being even to those I dislike."

"All right then, just call me when you're done."

* * *

Austin turns his cart to the snacks aisle, thinking that he'll tend to Dez's needs first before helping Ally with her list. As he rolls his cart through the aisle, he scans every product on the shelves, deciding which one Dez will like. Since he ends up being in the organic grocery store (and Dez hates organic stuff), he has to choose wisely for his friend. He _has _to like whatever he buys for him.

Austin sighs. "This is hopeless—ooh! Sweet potatoes—and Cheetos! Dez eats this kind of stuff. I'm pretty sure he can't turn this down." He mumbles to himself as he takes the mentioned snacks from the shelf and scans both packages.

Putting the two snacks on his cart and taking three more of each, he turns his head to look at the rest of the aisle and Austin's eyes dilates upon setting his sight on a very familiar girl.

He remembers that long toned legs, that long blonde hair that always cascades down her back in waves, and that beat-up red Toms that she loves to wear. He remembers her very well…Cassidy, her ex-girlfriend. They have been together for almost three years, only for them to split up due to her moving out of the country.

Austin directs his eyes away from the girl. He grabs his cart and just as he's about to turn around, Austin hears the very familiar voice calling out his name. He shuts his eyes tightly knowing he's already caught before flashing a smile and turning back around to face his ex-lover.

Cassidy pushes her cart towards Austin, a giant grin flashes across her face. She's blooming, Austin's not going to lie, and suddenly he remembers everything he loved about her.

"Austin." Cassidy breathes out.

"Cassidy." He acknowledges.

Cassidy's smile widens, something Austin thinks is no longer possible as she's already smiling so big. "It's been a long time, don't you think?" She utters.

Austin nods, pressing his lips together. Awkwardly, he fidgets in his spot and says, "Yeah, it's been a while."

"So…how are…things?" Cassidy questions.

"It's been…it's been nice. Our band's doing well, I guess. We've already booked a few gigs this coming weekend." Austin answers.

Impressed, Cassidy nods. "Good to hear that your band's on the right track."

"Me too. It's like music to my ears."

They stand there in silence, both not aware of what to say next. Austin secretly studies Cassidy; searching for any kind of changes that occurred to her since the last time he saw her was approximately two years ago.

"Um…" Austin mutters uneasily, reaching behind his ear to lightly scratch it.

"I see you're still doing that habit of yours…the ear thing." Cassidy takes note.

"Yeah," Austin chuckles nervously, "can't actually get rid of it."

"Hey, um…Austin, do you maybe want to go—"

"There you are!" Ally suddenly appears, pushing a nearly full shopping cart with her. She stops beside Austin and gives him a quick kiss on his cheek, which completely startles the boy. "I've been looking all over for you. I was calling you, but you weren't answering." She adds.

"Oh, I kind of ran into…um…" Austin stammers.

"An old friend." Cassidy finishes. "Hi, I'm Cassidy. I'm an old friend of Austin."

"Oh, nice to meet you. I'm Ally." Ally introduces, taking Cassidy's hand that the girl stretches out earlier and shaking it formally brief.

"She's my—"

"Girlfriend." Ally finishes, looping an arm around Austin's before glancing up at him.

Cassidy is quite taken aback when Ally introduces herself as Austin's girlfriend. Her smile falters for a short moment though she manages to show a somewhat faux smile afterwards.

"Well, it was nice bumping into you two. I better go now." Cassidy says as she nods at Austin sadly and turns to walk away.

The moment Cassidy is out of their sights, Austin swivels around and raises an eyebrow at Ally with a smirk he can no longer hide from her.

"So…my girlfriend, huh?" Austin questions, still attempting to suppress the grin even though he knows to himself that it's already showing. He's even sure he's blushing.

Ally scoffs playfully, pushing her cart as well as soon as Austin does. "What? I saw how awkward it was so I—"

"You heard us, didn't you?" Austin interrupts, turning the cart to a different aisle.

"That is the most ridiculous thing ever! I would never—" Ally stops her sentence midway when she notices Austin glancing down at her with convincing eyes. Ally lets out a heavy sigh before she speaks. "Yes, I did hear the two of you. I was about to turn to that aisle, but then I heard a girl calling your name so I just had the feeling that I should…you know…" she trails off.

"I'm not even going to complain. Cassidy and I are over for a long time and I'm completely over her. Besides, I don't mind you being my girlfriend." Austin says, whispering his last sentence.

"Hey, just because I introduced myself as your girlfriend to Cassidy doesn't mean I really am. We only have to pretend to be a couple when she's around, and I'm pretty sure we won't be seeing her around frequently." Ally counters; crossing off the things on her list she already has as she pushes her cart using her elbows.

"How can you be so sure about that?" Austin asks.

"Don't question my instincts, Austin Monica."

"Are you really sure? Like, one-hundred percent sure?"

"Yes, and why wouldn't I be?"

"Because she's right there," Austin answers, pointing a finger at Cassidy's direction.

"Stop pointing, that's rude." Ally scolds, swatting Austin's hand. "And I just said I only _had _a feeling, okay?"

_"__Don't question my instincts, Austin Monica." _Austin mimics, which earns a smack upside the head from Ally.

Austin lets out a complaint a little too loud, catching Cassidy's attention from the other end of the aisle. She turns her head and she sadly flashes a small smile before turning away and going on to the next item on her own list.

* * *

After putting away all of their groceries in the trunk of Ally's car (Austin reasoning they should put a divider in order to distinguish which groceries are whom), they start to head back to their apartments. But it suddenly seems like Ally has other ideas.

"We should grab some frozen yogurts. It's too warm." Ally suggests, taking a quick glance to her right to look at Austin.

"Don't you have to bring those groceries back home?"

Ally shakes her head, this time keeping her eyes on the road rather than glancing briskly at the boy sitting on the passenger seat. "Nope. Brooke's not going to be back till later tonight anyway. I'm pretty sure no one's going to be rummaging through our pantry for a while." She says, then adds, "How about you? Won't Dez mind if we do grab some froyos?"

"Well…he mentioned something about being hungry before I left, but…he'll survive."

"Okay then, froyos it is."

Ally only spent five minutes of driving before they arrive at the nearest frozen yogurt bar. Austin and Ally hurries inside, both are eager to serve themselves a cold and refreshing cup.

Austin stays loyal to the usual chocolate-flavored frozen yogurt as Ally gets a cup of watermelon sorbet. After arguing in front of the register girl on who's going to pay, the yogurts are finally paid by Austin after secretly sliding a twenty towards the cashier.

Austin apologizes to the cashier girl, but she thinks it's cute.

"So…" Ally starts as soon as the two of them are seated at the far corner of the yogurt bar. "Tell me about Cassidy."

Austin groans and tilts his head backwards exasperatingly. "Do I really have to?" He asks.

Ally nods. "I don't want to be nosy or anything, but I'm interested in your relationship with Cassidy."

"You said you don't want to be nosy, but why are you being one?" Austin retorts.

Ally spoons her yogurt. "Look, you don't have to tell me everything. Just a brief explanation will suffice. You found out about Dallas, didn't you?"

"I did, but you managed to hide it from us for—oh, I don't know, two years!"

"Come on, Austin, at least now you know, right?"

Austin sighs, disbelieving himself for giving into Ally's weak protests.

"Cassidy and I met because of our parents. Her dad's company was slowly going out of business and my dad, the most serious businessman you'll ever meet, saw some potential in her family's business. When he found out that it was going to end soon, he didn't even hesitate with helping them. My dad then had this idea to merge both businesses and develop it into something new. He left his own company to pursue the rising business he and Cassidy's dad created." Austin explains, playing his yogurt with his green plastic spoon.

"Your dad sounds really nice." Ally comments.

Austin nods proudly. "He is…and he's a smart one, too."

"And then what happened? I mean, how did you two actually meet? Were you in some kind of party or private meeting of the two companies or…?" Ally inquires eagerly.

"The first time I saw her was during the business party. She was wearing this polka-dotted blue dress that showed her curves so well. Her blonde hair was even longer that time and I remember her turning around and her hair accidentally brushing my face. She realized what happened and that was the first time I saw her eyes. They were blue…very blue."

* * *

_"__Oh, my goodness, I'm sorry!" Cassidy apologized, her cheeks turning into a slight shade of pink as she looked down at her yellow wedges. "Dang it, I knew I should've cut my hair shorter. Some of the strands probably poked you in the eyes. I'm really sorry."_

_Austin smiled at her. "It's fine. It's not a big deal anyway." He answered._

_Cassidy then started laughing and Austin had to ask what humored her._

_"__I just feel so ashamed and embarrassed about myself that I just felt the need to lessen my awkwardness by laughing at myself." Cassidy replied._

_Austin found it cute. He found it cute the way she closed her eyes when she laughs and—man, her laugh was the most adorable sound he'd ever heard._

_Cassidy must have noticed Austin staring at her that she immediately stopped laughing and her hands found its way to her mouth._

_"__I'm sorry. That was so…so unladylike. I should have been more poised and…oh, boy! I just realized I haven't even introduced myself yet. How inconsiderate of me." She rambled._

_As Cassidy continued ranting about how rude she was for not properly introducing herself first, Austin was just gawking at her the entire time, mesmerized with how beautiful and carefree she was. Long story short, she was the perfect girl. She fitted the description Austin gave himself of a perfect girl. She was everything he was looking for. She was beautiful, funny, loud, confident, awkward, and…unpretentious. She didn't have to be anybody to impress him because the first time Austin ever laid his eyes on her, she didn't have a single clue she already had his heart._

_"__I'm Cassidy Keet." She introduced as she held out a hand for Austin._

_"__Austin. Austin Moon."_

_For the first time that night, Austin realized that she was the daughter of his dad's new business partner; and considering that fact, Austin had zero doubts that he and Cassidy would be seeing a lot of each other in the upcoming weeks._

* * *

Austin finishes his story the same time he and Ally finish their cups of yogurt.

"We better get going." Ally informs, standing up from her chair and throwing her empty cup in the garbage. "Dez's probably dying of starvation."

"What?" Austin asks. "I told a very long story, you should at least have something to say afterwards."

"I do, I just want to say it when we're in the car. Even though we're talking, at least we're on our way home." Ally counters, fishing her car keys out of her pocket not even giving Austin a single glance.

Ally admits to herself, she feels a slight tinge of jealousy. She's "slightly_" _jealous of the way Austin thought of Cassidy back then. She's "slightly"jealous of the fact that Austin basically portrayed Cassidy as a goddess. Although that's already in the past and he already guaranteed he's totally over her, she can't help but feel weird about it. Ally's sure she still have feelings for Dallas, but ever since Austin has been around more than him, everything is just becoming more and more complicated.

When they load inside the car, Ally quickly turns the engine on and immediately drives away. She remains quiet the entire time, occasionally changing the radio station every single time a cheesy love song comes on.

Austin takes note of her atypical behavior and decides to not mention anything about it. Even though she told him she's going to comment on his story once they're in the car, Austin senses she's not going to be uttering a single word any time soon.

* * *

"I've watched every _Harry Potter _and _Pirates of the Caribbean _movies, it's about time you arrive." Dez says as soon as he sees Austin stepping in to their shared apartment.

"Sorry, mate, Ally had a froyo craving." Austin apologizes, setting the grocery bags on the kitchen counter.

"You went with Ally? Is that why all the stuff you bought are _organic_?" Dez asks after taking note of the logos on the grocery bags.

"Don't you even dare complain! It was a good store, not going to lie. Besides, there were some sweet potatoes and Cheetos in there." Austin protests, feeling the need to defend the good quality of the organic grocery store that he and Ally went to.

"They better be good." Dez utters.

"Hey, can I ask you something?" Austin asks, looking seriously at his friend seated across the kitchen counter from him.

"Ally problems, I'm guessing?"

"What else is new?" Austin replies. "But anyway, something weird happened a while ago. Do you remember Cassidy?"

"She's back?" Startled, Dez asks.

"I saw her at the grocery store. We made small talk and I guess she was about to ask me to go grab something and possibly catch up when Ally suddenly interrupted and introduced herself to Cassidy as _my_ girlfriend." Austin answers, taking out items from the grocery bags and setting them each carefully on the kitchen counter.

"Did she really? Why would she do that?"

Austin shrugs. "She said she did it to save my butt."

"Are you sure there's no hidden meaning behind it?"

"Didn't I tell you already? She have a thing for Dallas, of course that didn't mean anything."

"Who can really tell, Austin? We never know."

"Anyway, we're not sure if we're going to be seeing more of Cassidy in the future, but Ally and I are going to pretend to be a couple whenever she's around." Austin informs.

"That promises to be interesting."

"Ally was also very eager to learn about my relationship with Cassidy, so when we were at the yogurt bar, I told her everything." Austin says, folding all the grocery bags neatly and starts putting all the items to where they belong in the kitchen.

"And I'm guessing the drama came after you told her the story?" Dez guesses, following Austin with his eyes.

Austin stops putting stuff away and turns to look at Dez. "She was so weird after that. I mean, you know how Ally is, right? Chirpy, very energetic, and…you get the point. She was just silent, switching the radio station every time a love song comes on, and she's not even giving me a glance or a smile or…it was just so weird."

Dez runs his tongue over his upper front teeth, easily catching on Ally's peculiar actions.

"She's jealous." Dez announces. "Trust me, she is."

"Why would she be?"

"Do you really have to ask me that, Austin? Really? Are you really that blind? I mean, come on! Everything's right in front of your face! Interrupting your conversation with Cassidy just as she's about to ask you out, introducing herself as your girlfriend, eager to know about your previous relationship, and then giving you a silent treatment afterwards…don't you think those are clear symptoms of jealousy?"

"But…_Dallas_—"

"Fuck him. Let's pretend Ally's falling for you. Can Dallas really have a say in this? He doesn't control her, Austin. She's completely in charge of her feelings. She gets to like the people she wants to like. So if Ally really is falling for you and you like her too—"

"I don't like her—"

"Yes, you do. Don't argue with me, Austin." Dez interrupts. "What I was saying before you _completely interrupted me_, if the feelings are mutual between the two of you, don't you even _think _about Dallas, okay? He doesn't dictate everything. Who is he anyway to intervene with who you or who Ally wants to date?"

Flabbergasted, Austin stares at Dez as the latter boy happily munches on his Cheetos.

"Damn it, you made sense."

* * *

After setting all of her own grocery bags on the kitchen counter, Ally takes out her phone from her pocket and instantly dials Trish's number.

The latter girl immediately answers.

"Hey Trish, are you busy today?" Ally asks.

"Um, I'm with Carrie actually. Why?"

"Can you two come over just for a while? This is not going to take long, I promise. I just…I just want someone to talk to." Ally informs, packing back and forth in her kitchen.

"Why? What's wrong?"

"Austin…and groceries…and ex-girlfriend…and frozen yogurt…and feelings."

* * *

**I'm sorry for using a swear word, but Dez was just so frustrated with how naive Austin and Ally are being to each other's feelings. I promise, I won't do it again...unless it's ****_really _****necessary.**

**And I don't know if I should make Cassidy a major character. Should I? Because if I did include her, I don't know what's the storyline going to be like if she stayed. Originally, I only wrote her as a minor character. But...what do you guys think? Major or minor?**

**Let me know in your reviews!**

**Thanks!**


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